Slave Verse 3: Bungalow Blues
by Gamebird
Summary: The events of stopping Nathan traumatize both Sylar and Peter, in different ways. They retreat to a remote island where they try to learn to love each other again.
1. Property of Sylar

**A/N: This is Slave Verse 3, picking up directly after Slave Verse 2. It seems that Slave Verse has consumed my mind. These chapters (4 or 5 of them) recount Peter and Sylar's adventures on the island, recovering from the trauma of the end of Slave Verse 2. Because in my universes, when horrible things happen to people, they're actually a bit messed up by it, as opposed to the TV show, where they tend to get over it almost instantly.**

**The only plot here is the recovery of the characters, who get to know one another, decide if it's love or lust and if their kind of hastily conceived plan to right the world can really get off the ground.**

They parted. Peter made a soft sigh and didn't bother to wipe away his tears. Sylar rolled over on his back and shut his eyes. Peter stayed on his side, facing Sylar and when the taller man wasn't looking, Peter watched him through nearly closed eyes. The sun warmed them and a pleasant sea breeze ruffled their hair. Sylar tried to relax, but he really couldn't. His mind kept replaying events however much he told it to cut it out.

Oddly, it most replayed the parts from yesterday where Peter had told him he'd need to trust him and that he wanted to be with him. He'd planned on betraying him from the start. Sylar kept his thoughts to himself about this though. Nathan was dead and he was with Peter. Bitching about how this had come to pass would be stupid. Well… Nathan was probably dead. He wasn't really sure. He looked away from Peter, down the beach, and tried to think about other things.

After a long period left alone to his thoughts, a soft nasal sound caught his attention. Peter was snoring. A slow smile covered Sylar's face. He wondered if Peter had slept at all last night. Now that he considered it, he didn't think so. Peter had been awake when Sylar had woken. Now he was sleeping, comfortable enough with Sylar to let down his defenses. Or at least, Sylar hoped he was. Peter was complex and he didn't pretend to understand him. It was part of his charm.

He sat up, forearms on knees and watched the sunlight dance on the water, watched the surf roll into the shore in steady swells. There was really nothing to do here except think and come to terms with things. Obviously Peter had thought this through as well. Sylar stood up. He felt restless. Peter stirred.

He glanced back at him and said, "Go back to sleep, Peter. I'm just going to walk around the island. I'm not leaving."

Peter blinked a few times in way of reply and shut his eyes, but his body didn't relax and he didn't go back to sleep. Sylar left him to the faux-slumber and did what he'd said he was going to do. He walked.

It wasn't a big place, hardly more than a few acres, and the beach wasn't all that long. The island was roughly crescent shaped, with the outermost side to the east and the protected inside of the crescent to the west. Sylar supposed that said something about local storm patterns, but he didn't bother to think about it much.

What he thought about was what had happened and how deeply that had upset him. He thought about kissing Peter and how he, Sylar, had unintentionally flinched from him more than once. He thought about Peter's patience with him, moving slower, reaching out to him, accepting the sudden distance between them and making careful but steady steps to close it. Peter was doing all the work in the relationship at the moment. Sylar couldn't have that.

He snorted at his own ego, but there it was. Now that he was away from Peter, he could think a little more freely as he trudged through the sand, letting it abrade his bare feet. He was upset that he couldn't touch Peter without thinking about Nathan's hands. Sylar had always had a thing about first times, but this was a lot deeper than the knowledge Peter had had a lot more partners before himself. It was more like seeing what he'd seen had made Peter filthy to him, dirty, soiled and used.

He stopped and kicked the sand. It was unsatisfying. He wished there was a can or something more substantial to kick around. He wandered up to where the sand stopped and the vegetation began, found a piece of driftwood and lobbed it into the ocean. That made him feel a little better.

He'd been traumatized to see what he'd seen. He was honest enough with himself to admit it. Most people talked of brain bleach jokingly. It occurred to him he could ask Peter to remove the memories. He shivered. While he wanted them gone, what did that say of his relationship with Peter? How could he understand and deal with what had happened to Peter if he couldn't remember it?

If it had traumatized him to _see_ it, what was it like for Peter, who had actually had it happen to him? What was it like for Peter, who had had it happen to him not just last night, but apparently frequently enough for it to be a pattern? No one had been surprised by what had occurred, except himself. It was a script. They'd played these roles often. He closed his eyes, shook his head and rubbed his forehead. He suspected it would have bothered him less to have it happen to him than to have to helplessly watch it happen to someone he cared about.

He paused and looked up at the bungalow. He'd made it halfway. He continued on his walkabout.

Peter wanted to be with him - that was clear. He wanted to be with Peter - that was also clear, despite recent events. Peter had given him back not only his own abilities, but every ability he had as well and the power to pick up new ones as easily as Peter did. He'd made them equals. Nathan had stolen from him the capacity to be intimate and comfortable with Peter. That was wrong. He'd been cheated. He clenched his fists restlessly and walked faster.

He wondered what had happened to Nathan. He hadn't been dead when Sylar had suicided and he'd been gone when he was resurrected. He walked for a little while with his mind blank, unable to process, his mind running in Nathan-patterned loops.

In the distance, he could see Peter, still rolled on his side and facing the direction Sylar had walked away. Even with enhanced hearing, the constant noise of the ocean would let him get pretty close without his footsteps giving him away. Hopefully Peter had gone back to sleep, because a wakeful Peter was one who would want to be intimate with him, even if it was only eye contact. Another surge of anger ran through him at what Nathan had despoiled for him. Peter belonged to _him_. It wasn't right that he couldn't be with him without having these unwelcome thoughts. He was going to _do_ something about that.

Peter rolled over as he approached, confirming that he'd been lying awake waiting for his return. This was also unsatisfactory. Peter shouldn't be so worried about him that he was on alert. He should be relaxed and confident, content that if Sylar said he wanted to take a walk and think, that this wasn't a big deal and Peter wouldn't be silently wound up about it.

He stood at the end of the cushion Peter was laying on, looking down at him. Sylar's fists were on his hips. It didn't occur to him what kind of image he cut, with an angry, determined mien and backlit so starkly by the newly risen sun that Peter could barely see his face. Peter blinked up at him very, very uncertainly. Sylar looked really pissed, and he was, just not at Peter.

"Stay here," he said roughly and teleported out. It didn't take him long to find what he wanted - a bottle of suntan lotion. He'd seen the welcoming basket on the kitchen counter, stuffed with papers and products for the use of the resort guests. He hadn't specifically seen the bottle of sunscreen, but it was reasonable for it to be there. He popped back to Peter, who was sitting up and looking a little desolate.

Sylar knelt on his own cushion and showed the bottle to Peter, who let out a tense breath he'd been holding and blinked, eyes dodging in obvious relief. "Lay down on your stomach," Sylar directed, his tone still rough. In his mind's eye, every spot on Peter's skin that Nathan had touched was bright red and off limits. He was going to take care of that. Nathan couldn't have him. He wasn't Nathan's. Peter belonged to Sylar.

He squirted the lotion liberally across Peter's back. Peter twitched at the cool gel hitting him. Sylar paused to admire the sexual imagery of Peter having creamy, whitish ribbons of liquid across him. He chuckled and let out some of his tension, lacing his fingers together and stretching them, popping his knuckles. He reached out with his hands and held them above where Nathan had stroked Peter's back, where he'd scratched him and left red marks only hours before. It was time to exorcize some demons.

He put his hands to Peter's skin and smeared the coconut-scented lotion over his back, covering every inch. Initially, when it smeared, it was white and opaque. This was helpful, as it showed Sylar where it was and wasn't and let him be sure that he was touching every part. The map of Peter's body in his head began to break up. These parts didn't belong to Nathan anymore. He was reclaiming them. They were Sylar's. With that in mind, he dabbed out a little more lotion, smeared it thickly across Peter's back and wrote "Property of Sylar" on him. He grinned at that and moved on to shoulders and sides, leaving that there.

"What did you just write on me?" Peter said after a bit. Sylar told him. It wasn't like he wanted it to be a secret. Peter turned his face down and laughed. "God, I love you, Sylar."

"Now don't you heal that. Let it tan on there. I want that there." His tone was mostly teasing, but partly serious. He wondered if Peter would let him mark him like that. Peter seemed pretty permissive about that stuff.

He was only a little surprised and a lot gratified when Peter said, "Okay, _master_. I'll leave it there."

Sylar sat there with his hands on the small of Peter's back for a moment, trying to think and failing, and then stirred himself on. He rubbed under the waistband of Peter's shorts, but confined himself to a few finger widths under them, then skipped down to his thighs and worked down his legs. He added more lotion and rubbed at the muscles, massaging while he was at it. When he ran his hands across the back of Peter's knees, the darker-haired man tensed a little. When he did it with more pressure, Peter's whole body tightened. So of course Sylar did it again. And again.

Peter started breathing harder. "That's… um… kind of erogenous… Sylar."

Sylar cupped Peter's knee in one hand and pressed his thumb hard into the underside with the other, rubbing it back and forth. Peter moaned and suppressed the urge to writhe. His muscles tightened beautifully, tensing with every stroke. Sylar reflected that it was a good thing he'd done this - a thorough exploration of Peter's body was long overdue, especially if he'd missed something like this. He switched legs so he could work the other one. Peter put his hands on either side of his head, palms flat to the ground. He was panting and rubbing himself back and forth just a little on the cushion.

"Can I make you come just from this alone?" Sylar asked.

"Yeah," Peter breathed out in a whine.

"Huh. Good to know." Sylar stopped and went down Peter's calves. He was immensely pleased to hear Peter's frustrated whimper.

He rubbed his feet, which were sadly not nearly as stimulating for Peter, but he did still respond. And of course they were ticklish. Peter lay there and enjoyed his torture, making stifled noises and choked laughter, squirming but not actually yanking his feet out of Sylar's grip. It made Sylar very happy to see him react to his touch. He finally took pity on him and let him go.

"Roll over. And be careful not to smear your label."

Peter barked a short laugh and rolled over with care. Sylar worked back up his front. His legs were unremarkable, but his eyes were drawn repeatedly to Peter's groin. He was erect under his shorts. Sylar reached up once and stroked him - a single rub through the fabric as if to confirm what his eyes had told him. Peter lifted his hips into the gesture wordlessly but said nothing when Sylar went back to covering him with lotion. He skipped over his shorts and went to his chest.

Peter kept his eyes shut as Sylar covered every bit of his torso. As with his back, he slipped his fingers under the waistband of his shorts but, at least initially, didn't go further. It occurred to Sylar that his mental map of where Nathan had touched Peter did not include his groin. Nathan had never touched Peter there last night. His fingers probed under the waistband a bit further. Peter shifted his hips again and made a soft sound of need.

"Don't move your back. I'm serious about not smearing that." He squirted more lotion into his hand and sent it into Peter's shorts.

Peter put his head back immediately and started breathing harder. "I love you, Sylar."

"Yeah? Love you too." He pulled back the shorts so he could work him more easily. Peter was already very aroused, still turned on from the teasing of the backs of his knees and his feet. Sylar's even strokes made him twitch and moan. He knelt beside Peter on the beach, out in the open in the light of a new day, and brought him off. He thought about how this too was something Peter didn't have with Nathan, or at least hadn't had recently. Peter couldn't get it up with Nathan - or he suspected, even while Nathan was around. Sylar smiled at the semen on his hand now - proof that he had something from Peter that Nathan couldn't get.

Peter's breathing slowed and his lids were heavy. After a few moments, he carefully rolled over so the sun was on his back. Sylar did a little touch up on him. Peter put his head down and went to sleep. Sylar lay down next to him, but again, his mind wouldn't let himself go. He gave up trying to put it in any order and let it run in endless circles.

He went swimming again, which caused Peter to stir once more, sitting up to watch him like he might drown. That was silly. He could breathe underwater. Even though drowning wasn't a danger, for Peter's sake he came up to the surface frequently and came back to shore after a much shorter dip than he'd planned. Peter lay back down when he returned, confirming for him, just in case he wasn't sure, that yes, Peter wouldn't rest unless he was right there next to him. Sylar put his hand on Peter's calf and it occurred to him he was no longer so bothered by touching him. Sylar smiled at his victory. He patted Peter's leg and just sat next to him, watching the sea and letting Peter sleep.

Time passed. The ocean was creeping closer to them. Peter was snoring again. Rather than break his rest, Sylar started constructing a berm of sand around them to hold back the tide. It didn't stop it, but it delayed the waters. When it was clear the cushions would get wet within the next score of waves, Sylar picked his up. The motion woke Peter, who blinked up at him. "Let's go back to the bungalow." The sun was beating down directly on them now. For some time Sylar had felt his regeneration working on his skin, a faint tingle that let him know that without it he'd have had a ferocious sunburn.

Peter stood up and picked up his cushion. In the shifting perspective, Sylar could see the outline of red letters on Peter's back. He grinned and laughed to himself. He snagged the bottle of suntan lotion. Regeneration had held off his own burn, but Peter had obediently taken that ability off-line to allow Sylar's message to sink in. Sylar was tickled to see that.

They teleported back. Peter put his cushion back out on the chair and stumbled to the bedroom. He fell on the bed and stayed there. Gabriel got out a pineapple, remembering that Peter had picked it to eat first the day before, from the fruit tray. He cut it up carefully and cubed it. He filled a bowl with precut chunks, but Peter seemed truly asleep again and not just resting.

He suspected Peter's sleep would end the moment he left the place, so he didn't. He pulled out the papers from the welcome basket, found a beer inside the icebox (which had no ice and was therefore just a set of insulated shelves - but it had two different kinds of beer in it) and retired to the balcony. He used a frost ability to chill the beer. _Ah, that's better._

He kicked up his heels and sorted through the material. There was a menu or a grocery list where he could prioritize their wishes for foods and sundry products. Sylar went through and checked things off. Peter could make changes to it later if he wished, but he seemed sort of out of it.

Sylar set the list aside when he was done and thought about that. Peter had lost his brother, a man who had had an enormous impact on his life, who'd used him, abused him and generally been a bastard of the highest order. Quite aside from the lack of sleep last night, it occurred to Sylar that maybe Peter was depressed or at least suffering some emotional issues related to this. _Huh._ He wasn't sure what to do about it, but it was something to keep in mind.

He was sure a psychologist would have a field day with Peter. Speaking of field days, he took a deep swig of beer and sorted through the other papers, flipping past the ones detailing the rules for open fires or first aid or where the gun for signal flares was located or how to identify dangerous local critters like scorpions and certain jellyfish. His eye had caught on something else earlier and he found it, predictably, at the bottom of the pile. It was a map of the underwater topography near the island along with a brightly colored brochure extolling the wonders of snorkeling and scuba diving. There was also a little soft-back book full of illustrations of local fish and reef life.

Peter came out of the bedroom, stretching and yawning. Sylar rolled his head back to look at him. Peter walked forward to the kitchen bar that separated the kitchen from the dining area. Or breakfast nook. Or whatever these spaces were called. He picked up the bowl of pineapple chunks and carried it out. "Feeling better?" Sylar asked.

"Yeah. Is this for me?"

"Yes, it is," Sylar said fondly, his voice soft.

Peter smiled at him and blushed a little. He came out and sat down on the other recliner. "Whatcha looking at?" he said, popping a chunk in his mouth.

Sylar handed him the map. "I thought we might go diving. Look at the fish."

"Mm. Might eat one. I'm starved." Peter put the map across his knees and kept eating the fruit.

"You really think with your stomach a lot, don't you?"

Peter gave him a dirty look.

"What's that for?" Sylar asked of the look.

Peter frowned. "It's either my stomach or my dick, is that it?"

Sylar blinked at him. He hadn't been thinking that at all, but now that Peter mentioned it… He gave himself a little shake. Peter had a lot more going on with him than base instincts. Even if Sylar happened to be very partial to Peter's base instincts. They were easy to gratify, for one thing. He could fuck him or feed him and the thing was done - everybody was happy. More complicated issues like saving the world or freeing the slaves or helping him handle the fact that he'd been fucked over by his brother for the worst part of two decades and then had to kill the guy seconds after having his cock in his mouth - well, Sylar was a bit at a loss there. And he thought _his_ childhood had been messed up.

Peter shook his head. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm just… grumpy, okay? I'm sorry."

"It's okay, Peter." Sylar looked away. "It was a kind of rough night."

"Yeah," Peter said glumly, folding the map back up.

"And about that," Sylar sighed. He didn't really want to ask this, but he wanted to get past it and get it behind him. "What did you do with Nathan? He wasn't dead."

Peter got up and stalked off into the kitchen, not answering. "Where did you get that beer?"

"In the refrigerator." Sylar felt a pang of tension at Peter's evasion. "Bring me another one, would you?"

"Sure." Peter came back, handing it over. He opened his own and sipped it, frowning. "Warm beer. Yay," he said unenthusiastically.

Sylar smiled a little and said, "That's what you have me around for." He extended a single finger and frosted Peter's bottle for him.

"Oh! I didn't think of that."

Sylar smiled more. "Pleased to be of service." He let the smile slip and picked up his first beer, finishing it off. He was wondering if he should ask the question again, or accept that Nathan was still alive somewhere and teleport away because it was all a botched job and he couldn't trust Peter but at least he had his abilities back…, or just leave it alone.

He was going for 'leave it alone' when Peter finally answered. "I teleported out over the Atlantic and disintegrated him. Dropped the ashes into the water. They can't bring him back."

Sylar blinked at Peter steadily for a bit. Then he asked, "Wasn't he still alive?"

"Yes." Peter's voice was utterly frozen.

"Oh," Sylar said, imagining the agony involved with being disintegrated to death. "Well. That's nice."


	2. Baby Steps

**A/N: Dragontrybe - chapter 5 will address some of the history, written just for you.**

Peter glared at him, then suddenly began laughing hysterically. A moment later he was crying and sobbing into his hands. Sylar blinked at him, uncertain of the rapid emotional shift. When the crying seemed likely to stay for a while, he got up and stood next to Peter, petting his hair. He told Peter, "He had it coming, you know?"

Peter nodded and didn't say anything. He slowly got himself under control again. Sylar stood there and rubbed back and forth across Peter's shoulders, still lost in contemplation of Nathan's possibly horrifically painful death. He hoped Peter had at least done it slowly. Very slowly. He sort of doubted it though.

"Come on, pet. Let's go put these abilities to good use. I've already figured out we can fly underwater so long as we don't go too fast."

Peter stood up and looked at Sylar gratefully for a while. He took a deep breath and let it out.

"You okay?" Sylar asked.

"Yeah. I like it when you call me 'pet.' That's nice." He kissed Sylar, who smirked at him. "It's just between us."

Sylar smiled. Maybe Peter was also looking for things in their relationship that didn't remind him of Nathan. He could hope. Because he sure as hell didn't want to have a threesome with a freaking ghost hovering over his shoulder every time he made out with Peter. Admittedly the guy had been offed only hours ago, so expecting Peter to move on already was probably a little impatient of him. Didn't Peter make a big deal about him needing to work on patience?

They consulted the map again, this time jointly, and agreed on where to go. They flew out over the ocean and went underwater, exploring the nooks and crannies of the seabed, presenting one another with things they'd found, playing hide and seek in a kelp patch they discovered and annoying the local marine life by chasing the larger members of it relentlessly. In other words, they played like a couple of little boys with superpowers and had a hell of a good time.

They came back when the sun began to set. Sylar tossed the food and goods list in front of Peter for his review while there was still some light. He walked off to open a cabinet, looking at what canned goods were stocked for them. He said, "As much as I enjoyed the last time I ordered groceries, this time I…" Sylar's voice ended, trailing abruptly off into silence. He thought about that last time. He thought about how it had made him feel - not just in a physical way, but emotionally.

He looked intently at Peter. He closed the two strides to him and took Peter's face in both his hands, being a little more careful than he wanted because Peter had a surprised, wary expression. Sylar bent in and kissed him, deeply, passionately and immediately. When his tongue touched Peter's lips, Peter inhaled sharply and immediately ran his hand behind Sylar's head to hold them together. Peter stood and breathed hard against Sylar's cheek, his breath puffing hotly against him. Twice Sylar started to pull back and twice Peter gave a little counter-tug to resist it without making it impossible for him to break away. After the second time, Sylar stayed with it until Peter finally sagged away from him.

"Liked that, huh?" Sylar said smugly.

Peter put his hands on the other man's hips and bowed his head against Sylar's chest. "Needed it. You haven't… not since… Thank you." He was quiet for a moment. Sylar ruffled his hair affectionately. Peter said, "I thought it would take you longer."

"Now, now, pet. Don't be insulting." He pulled away and went back to looking in the cabinets, feeling pleased with himself. "How do you feel about SPAM?"

"Sounds awesome. Is there bread?"

"There's crackers."

Peter laughed. "You know, we could teleport somewhere for din-"

"No." Sylar cut him off firmly. "I want to stay here. Alone. No one else. It's helping me. I'm fucked up and I have no idea how you're even able to walk and talk. I like this. We've only been here a day. They'll be by to take our order tomorrow a couple hours after dawn and back with it before evening. But from what that brochure says, they're kind of sloppy about time around here."

Peter smiled a little, encouraged by Sylar's statements even if he was disappointed about dinner. He hadn't come here for the food, after all. He didn't take offense to the sideways insult about his mental state. "I guess we'll have to find other ways to fill our time," Peter said quietly. Before Sylar could respond, he added, "I really liked diving today. That was good."

Sylar laid out crackers with squares of SPAM on them. They shared a can of mixed vegetables that neither of them bothered to heat up and washed it down with a couple more beers. By necessity, they were finishing the meal by candlelight.

"That is one of the most bizarre meals I've ever eaten," Peter said.

Sylar shrugged. "It's not ribeye and corn, I'll agree, but…" He shrugged. "It's here. Come on. Let's go out on the balcony. Do you know much about stars?"

"No, not really. New York, remember? Land of grey sky and light pollution."

Sylar nodded and blew out the candles with a single sweep of his hand and an ability that allowed him to manipulate air currents. "Yeah. Well, let me tell you about the Pleiades..."

Sylar sat on the recliner and had Peter lay in front of him, Peter's back to Sylar's chest. Sylar pointed out constellations and Saturn, discussed the rotation of the spheres and the dance of the sky. The universe was just a big clockwork device to him. Peter had a more romanticized and less clinical view of it, but their feelings on the subject weren't incompatible.

Peter spotted a falling star and they talked about it and the theory that part of the Caribbean had been formed by an ancient meteorite strike. They watched the sky revolve over them and waited to see if another meteor would be seen. Peter watched intently, Sylar's arms wrapped around him, keeping him warm. Sylar had been breathing heavily for a while now, but when he made a struggling snore, Peter was sure he'd lost the man to slumber.

"Oh, Sylar," he sighed, settling himself into a more comfortable position.

They only stayed that way for an hour or so before Sylar snapped awake, startled to have Peter on him and waking Peter too. His fingers seized on the other man in the dark.

"Easy, whoa, shh. It's okay," Peter soothed and at the sound of his voice Sylar calmed.

"Sorry." He let go his bruising grip.

"Nightmares are normal." Peter leaned in and kissed him. "So's broken sleep. Increased alertness. And difficulty relaxing. That's… part of why I wanted to be out here where nothing could distract us. Where we could unwind. And," he tilted his head a little - Sylar could see the gesture in the dim starlight even if he couldn't see Peter's face, "I wanted a chance to get to know you." He kissed him again.

Sylar got up and paced the kitchen restlessly for a while before Peter drug him into the bedroom and made him lie on the bed. When Peter tried to touch him he kicked him away with a savagery that was really not called for, but Peter didn't complain or even comment. He just retreated to the far side of the bed and stayed there.

Eventually Sylar got back to sleep, but as Peter had predicted, it was frequently broken. Unlike Peter, Sylar wasn't hyper-aware of where his partner was, nor was he overly concerned to wake up and find the bed empty. Maybe he should have been, given what happened last time he woke up and Peter was gone, but he trusted.

It meant he slept through the arrival of the boat, the handing over of their requests and the delivery of some staples and a satellite phone. The phone was sitting out conspicuously on the kitchen counter when Sylar walked out, like Peter had left it there for him to see. Peter was on a recliner on the balcony, flipping through the book on fish. Sylar went to him and tousled his hair. "Pet?"

"Master." Peter smiled up at him, closing his book, but slipping a finger into it to hold his place.

Sylar smiled back at what had become an endearment between them. "Why the phone?"

"Noah wanted to talk to me. And Jason. He's the head of staff. Well, Jason wanted to talk to Nathan, but he got me."

"Hmp." Sylar flopped into the other recliner. "Why didn't you just shift into Nathan and talk? I'm assuming you're saying you didn't do that."

"Yeah, you got it right. Being Nathan is your job." Peter opened the book again.

Sylar blinked at him. He tried to think of something to say about that, but couldn't. He'd just expected that Peter would act as Nathan and… well, then who would Sylar be? Peter? That didn't make a lot of sense. Finally he said, "Did I see some bread in there?"

"Yep." Peter was continuing to read the entry on that particular fish. It was one they'd speculated on the day before, but hadn't bothered to look it up.

"Have you eaten?"

Peter looked up and smiled sweetly at him. "You know the only food I eat comes from you, don't you?"

Sylar stared at him again, replaying the last week and all the times Peter had taken food from his hands or lips, or in the case of the steak, food he'd put directly in front of the other man. After a moment, he said, "The fruit tray. You went in and got some of it out for yourself. And… and… the alfredo. You were eating that when I woke up."

Peter chuckled. "Joking. I was joking. But I could always claim that since you ordered the fruit tray and paid for the alfredo that it still counts." He shook his head. "No, I haven't eaten. But I _was_ waiting for you."

Sylar stood up and paused. "Well… it wouldn't exactly bother me if the only things you ate came from me."

Peter snorted, but kept reading. Sylar ran his hand through his hair again. Peter gave him a glance and half of a smile, which made Sylar feel better. If Peter ever started failing to react to him like Nathan had treated Peter, he thought he'd break. There was something really wrong about that. He went in and made toast, slathering half with honey and half with jam that came in tiny, single-serving pots. He carried it back out. "Come here, pet. Time for your feeding." He sat sideways on his recliner.

Peter smiled and dropped to his knees in front of him. Sylar didn't know what he'd expected, but seeing Peter kneel before him made him swallow and tense and have an unpleasant, unidentifiable emotional reaction. He was sure his face showed it, because Peter inched closer, putting a hand on his knee and said, "Master? This is only between us. No one else. You're my master. I'm _yours_." He turned, showing his back, where it clearly said, "Property of Sylar" in angry red letters.

That broke the tension and Sylar laughed. He bent forward and hugged Peter, putting their heads together ear to cheek. "You _still _haven't healed that? That's gotta hurt." He ran his hand down and could feel the increased heat coming from the sunburned skin.

Peter pulled back just enough to whisper in his ear, "You _promised_ you would hurt me." It sounded like something Peter had begged for and was thrilled to have received. His tone turned more playful with, "Of course, you _also_ said you'd fuck me." He licked Sylar's earlobe and all thoughts of toast were gone.

"Fuck," Sylar breathed, feeling his cock twitch and swell. When he didn't pull away, Peter nibbled on the ear, following the curve up and bringing his other hand to caress the opposite side of Sylar's face. Sylar swallowed and let him do it, let Peter nuzzle the skin behind his ear and then lick it, let him dig his nails into the back of his neck and pull him forward off the recliner and onto his knees, those knees having to spread to straddle Peter's, let him draw their bodies together and urge him up a little so Peter could mouth his chest while kneading his ass.

"Oh God, Peter. Why?" He wasn't even sure what he was asking, but his subconscious kept throwing a question at the forefront of his brain like it was important somehow.

Peter seemed to know what he was trying to find out. "Because I love you, and I want you, and this is an expression of love, no matter how much people try to pervert it. That's why they try - because this is pure, this is beautiful, and they're ugly people trying to hide their own evil behind a pretty veil. I love you. I want to give this to you. I want to give _myself_ to you. I want to be _yours_. Will you have me?"

Sylar couldn't remember why he wouldn't. Maybe if he'd thought about it a little more he'd have come up with a good reason, but being with Peter seemed to drive all coherent thought out of his mind. At least, it did while Peter was running his hands up his back and biting the skin in the center of his chest. Sylar's shaft was begging for release from the confines of his shorts. He held Peter's head, flattening the man's nose against him and making Peter turn his head a little to avoid that.

"I… I don't know what to do," Sylar admitted. Suddenly sex with Peter was scary, frightening. He wasn't sure why and he didn't examine it.

Peter looked up at him with a determined expression. Sylar remembered how Peter had dealt with Sylar's hesitancy about entering him in the bathroom. He relaxed. Peter would take care of him. It sounded stupid to think of it that way, but it was true and it was what he needed at the moment. Peter reached down and rubbed his cock within his shorts, putting his other hand on the small of his back and watching Sylar's face carefully.

"I'm going to lean over that recliner on my knees. You're going to get behind me. You'll see your name written across my back and you'll know it's true. I'm your _property_." He felt a surge of lust at that and his hips bucked lightly. Peter smiled, his mouth hanging open crookedly. "Yeah," he breathed. "You've always wanted me." He stroked harder. "You got me. I'm yours now. And everyone can know it. I know it. I know my place. I'm _yours_, irrevocably."

Sylar put his head back, his hips rocking steadily now. "Peter, you're going to make me come."

Peter put his head to Sylar's nipple and sucked at it. When Sylar started grunting inarticulately, Peter pulled back even though he had to fight Sylar's hands that tried to trap his head against him. His hand stopped. Sylar felt like he was right at the brink. He made a frustrated, lip-biting noise. "Peter… _please_." He caught Peter's hand and tried to bring it back, but Peter twisted away from him, his eyes still so intent on Sylar's.

He backed up and shimmied out of his shorts in record time as Sylar leaned forward, hands on knees, trying to focus.

"Master?"

He looked up. Peter was leaning over the recliner, his ass in the air.

"Fuck me, master. Show your slave his place."

Sylar shivered. He rose up on his knees and shoved down his shorts enough to free himself. He was upright and so hard he ached. He panted and paused, his cockhead at the cleft of Peter's ass. He was pretty sure he was about to come… almost in seconds. He could just stand here and he would…

"Come on baby. Do it in me. Inside me. Please." Peter's voice was a soft pleading and Sylar followed the directions.

He spat in his hand, wiped it on his dick (he was so sensitive it made him jerk), and pushed himself down. He trusted Peter to manage the opening. He took his hips and slid into him, feeling that delicious heat squeeze around him, slick and perfect. He looked down at Peter's back, where he'd marked him, where Peter had let him mark him. He didn't even need to thrust. He just came right then. "Ah! OH!" He clenched, toes curling, holding Peter's ass to himself.

He pulled out slowly, a shudder running through him as he did. There was still some nagging thought about why he hadn't been expecting to do this… _Nathan_. It hit him and he jerked his shorts over himself, a vision of Nathan fucking Peter in the ass up against himself flashing behind his eyes.

"You okay?" Peter asked, no longer doing a come on. He sounded cautious.

"Yeah. You did that on purpose," he accused.

Peter laughed and it snapped Sylar out of it a little. "Yeah, of course I did. I want to have sex with you, Sylar. We gotta break the ice. Gotta give you other things to think about than what happened. I'm having sex with _you_, not with _him_. And I know I've got to get you to think of _me_ instead of _him_."

"How do you know what I'm thinking?" he snapped defensively, getting back up on his seat.

"Because I've seen a lot of people messed up by my brother and I've had telepathy for a long time. I know what sort of things go through people's mind after that stuff."

Sylar chewed on his lip and looked off to the side. He huffed. He wanted to be angry. Peter shuffled over to him, naked. In a small voice, Peter asked, "Will you feed me, master?"

Sylar looked at him and said, "It's either your stomach or your dick, huh?"

Peter frowned. Sylar smiled a bit meanly, amused to have gotten under Peter's skin in return. He picked up a piece of toast and offered it in his own mouth. Peter leaned in and took it, letting his lips linger on Sylar's, meeting his eyes and then dropping his own gaze submissively. Sylar knew that Peter knew exactly what he was doing - it was a calculated act, but at the same time it didn't bother him much to know that. It was a language Peter was speaking to him, apologizing for manipulating him, maybe trying to tell him he needed him and wanted him and this was the best thing Peter could think of to try to get him.

Sylar gave him the bread from his own mouth, forgiving him. They ate quietly because everything that was being said between them didn't need words to be expressive. Sylar caressed Peter's shoulder at first, then the back of his neck and finally the back of his head, holding him to him for as long as he wanted, controlling exactly how long Peter's lips were on his own, when Peter came to him and when he parted. When the toast was gone, Peter leaned in and hugged him. Sylar allowed it, feeling indulgent and like an ass at the same time.

"Are you sure you can put up with me?" Sylar asked.

He felt Peter's face shift in a grin against his neck. "Yeah. You're great, really. It doesn't bother me. I'm pretty sure if I told you to cut it out, you would."

"And if I didn't?"

"Then I would still be yours."

Sylar snorted. He stroked Peter's hair. "Well, as long as my slave knows his place."


	3. Veni Vidi Vici

They spent that second morning diving and came in for lunch of mango and banana and a couple fruits neither of them knew the name of but tasted pretty good anyway. Sylar applied suntan lotion to Peter again and carefully repeated the lettering.

"You really like that, don't you?" Peter asked, feeling him tracing it out.

"Oh yeah. I love it. You can heal it back whenever you want." He shrugged. "You probably should before we go back."

Suddenly it was gone, and Peter's back was unblemished and perfect. "How's that look?"

Sylar frowned and then sighed, deflating a little. "Fine. I guess." He was disappointed, assuming Peter had wanted to heal it back immediately, since he'd more or less given permission.

Then it was back as before and he realized Peter was copying over it with an illusion. "Oh," Sylar said. "You're… saying you wouldn't need to let it heal."

"Right. No one will see it until we're alone. Or unless you want me to make it public, but I think there'd be some questions about why Nathan was letting me go around with Sylar's tramp stamp on me."

He laughed. "You're not a tramp. You're mine, only mine." Peter shifted in appreciation. Sylar bent and kissed the nape of his neck, since everywhere else had lotion. "Thank you."

They walked down to the beach together afterwards, Peter reading parts of one of the pamphlets out loud to Sylar. He was really intrigued by how you were supposed to treat scorpion stings and what a person should do if they stepped on a sea urchin. Sylar walked a little ahead, listening with half an ear, obviously disinterested, until Peter reached forward and grabbed his shoulder jerking him backwards. He fell on his ass in the sand and blinked up in surprise at Peter, who said, "Hey. I'm trying to talk to you here."

"Oh." Sylar blinked at him a little more and glanced around. Was there any valid reason why he was ignoring Peter? Not really - just that he wasn't interested in medical care. But Peter _was_. If he wanted respect… then he was going to have to give it. He grunted at the annoying life lesson of a relationship. But it wasn't nearly as annoying as not having Peter around. "Sorry. I'm listening now."

Peter scowled at him, caught between going on because Sylar looked genuinely focused on him now or wadding up the pamphlet because he thought Sylar was being patronizing. Hesitantly, Peter started on the section for jellyfish stings, talking about how it had come up in nursing school, but he'd never had a reason to use the information. The biggest risk was anaphylactic shock… he looked over. Sylar was listening attentively, still sitting on the sand with his legs crossed, forearms on knees. In fact, he seemed rather mesmerized by Peter's face.

Peter smiled self-consciously. "Are you listening to me?"

"I'm listening to you."

"Because you look like you're eye-fucking me."

"I'm doing that too. Please continue. I hadn't reached orgasm yet." Sylar managed to say this with a straight face.

Peter grinned and then laughed.

"That's a good look on you," Sylar said. "I like it. Now come down here where I can touch you and tell me what anaphylactic shock means."

"So you _were _listening to me." Peter sat next to him and Sylar laid an easy hand on his knee, rubbing a circle. They were near the top of where the water reached, but the tide was going out so they didn't need to move to avoid getting wet. Peter started describing symptoms and treatment, moving quickly from the essentials to examples. Then he got onto one of his peeves, which was how medical care was portrayed in movies and on TV.

When the talk shifted from technical things - that Sylar didn't know much about, other than what he'd seen with his victims - to popular media - which he was much freer to comment on - it became an actual discussion with give and take. Sylar also began scratching around in the sand while they talked, since as long as they were both speaking animatedly, it didn't look like he was being disrespectful. And he wasn't.

That was how they got started building a sand castle. Sylar fetched the empty SPAM can, a collection of sticks and a spatula. He was all about using tools for this and "his" half of the sand castle was orderly and precise, with sharp lines and a compact, blocky structure. Peter's was more free form and covered more space, with hills and berms and roundish towers with shells stuck in them here and there - whether as decorations or some kind of fortification was unclear.

Shortly into the project, Sylar had drawn a very straight line to separate his area from Peter's. After most of an hour, he realized that one of Peter's snaking, curving hillocks was trespassing into the bailey of his castle. Worse still, the line was gone.

"Where did… what happened to the line?" He was mildly outraged. "There was a line there. Peter?"

Peter smirked and acted innocent, moving down to fetch some more damp sand as his slow invasion continued. "I guess I must have smudged it a little."

"A little? It's completely gone." Sylar huffed and redrew. "This has to go." He pushed back Peter's hillock, destroying it.

"That has to go? No it doesn't. If that has to go, then _this_ has to go." Peter 'reorganized' the too-neat façade that Sylar had imposed across the front of both sides.

"You're… Peter! No. Stop that." He pushed him away. Peter fell back and dug a handful of sand from the beach. He leaned away, looking relaxed, and threw it on Sylar's back when he turned to correct Peter's 'damage'.

Sylar looked back at him. Peter grinned a challenge. Sylar returned the look with a glower and spoke in a low voice, "You know what this means, right? This is _war_."

"Bring it," Peter taunted, getting his feet under him and shifting his weight forward.

Sylar jumped on him. He was bigger and stronger with greater reach. Peter was faster and, as it turned out, quite a bit more familiar with hand-to-hand combat. It shouldn't have been surprising, since he'd spoken of his role in Nathan's security. What _was_ surprising was that Sylar eventually managed to pin him, though at the cost of his side of the sand castle.

Peter was chest down with Sylar's hand on his back, pressing him down, and his legs lifted and tangled, one bent back in a toe hold that robbed Peter of all leverage. His attempts to get loose just saw Sylar lunge him forward and reposition him right back where he started. By unspoken agreement, neither of them had used their abilities.

"You got me," Peter said, twisting his neck to look back.

"Do I?" Sylar gave him a little push, making Peter grunt as the air was shoved out of him.

"Yeah, I think so. You're going to get tired of holding me eventually." He squirmed a little, testing the bounds, but he'd already established the hold was valid.

"Peter, you tease. I'll never get tired of holding you."

Peter was quiet for a moment and moved his body gently in response to the flirt. Sylar didn't give him as much flex as he'd like. He waited a bit, then asked softly, "Are you going to let me go?"

"I haven't decided yet," Sylar said petulantly. "Without letting you go, I can't seem to get anything free except this hand here on your back. Maybe I could tickle you…" The pressure on his back let up. The fingers curled and danced against his skin a bit in a ticklish caress.

Peter sucked in his breath. "Let me go and I'll let you do more than tickle me."

Now it was Sylar's turn to be silent. Peter could feel his fingertips massaging his back instead of holding him down.

Peter changed his voice to low and seductive. "Do you want me? I'll let you take me. I love you."

Sylar gave him another little push and Peter shut up. "You're cheating. You're using my libido against me."

"I'll use any weapon I get, Sylar." He twisted back to look at him again. "And anyway, you're the one in control here. What are you going to do with me?"

Sylar blinked at him, thinking about that question on many levels. His fingertips massaged again lightly, crawling down Peter's spine. Peter's lids drooped and his back arched. He turned away and breathed harder. Sylar internalized that he really did have Peter Petrelli. That was just fucking amazing. Somehow, his plot had worked. How the hell did that happen?

"Well," Sylar said, his voice husky, "the plan was always pretty simple. I was going to fuck you, then we'd take over the world."

He released Peter's legs and let them down slowly. They ended up on either side of him, Peter on his knees, but his chest and shoulders still to the ground. Sylar's hand on his back continued its gradual crawl to the small of the other man's back, where it curled into his waistband. Peter moaned a little. Sylar pushed the shorts down to expose everything he needed access to, then pushed down his own. He took up his half-hard length and began pulling, tugging and fondling as his other hand ran up and down the seam of Peter's body.

He leaned forward and ran his fingers over the still-hot letters that spelled "Property of Sylar" on Peter's back. He grinned.

Peter said, "I love you, master. I love it when you fuck me. Please fuck me."

"I'm going to," Sylar said softly, wetting himself and putting himself in position. He wasn't as hard as he could have been, but it was enough if he went slow and he did. Peter worked with him, still talking about what a good master he was and how forgiving of Peter's mistakes and how much he prized being his slave and all manner of things that a part of Sylar's brain found really funny, but most of the rest found terribly arousing. That greater part told the lesser to shut it and he got on with the sexing.

He took hold of Peter's hips and thrust into him hard and fast, making Peter grunt. That… triggered an unpleasant memory. He shifted immediately to slower, two easy beats and one harder. He thought about how much he hated Nathan for screwing up a perfectly normal sex sound for him. His fingers dug in harder. Unconsciously, he was picking up his pace again, thinking about how he'd wished he had been there when Peter'd killed him, how he wished he'd stalled his own suicide to torture the asshole a bit.

He was fucking Peter hard and fast again, wishing Nathan's ghost _was_ around to see Peter submit to him, wanting to rub it in the bastard's face that Peter had left him to be with Sylar. He wanted a recording of Peter now, moaning his name and calling him master, so he could play it for Nathan and see his face contort with rage like it had when Peter had told him he'd topped Sylar (Sylar made a mental note to promote that up the list of sexual things he wanted to do with Peter - a list that seemed to be growing by the second as his mind tore apart the spectre of Nathan Petrelli and ground it under his heel).

He could feel himself riding higher and higher towards his peak and Peter was grunting with every shove he gave him, but he didn't give a damn now. Grunt all he wanted. He was jogging Peter's body against the sand and making a rut in it, carving out the shape of Peter's torso against the ruins of his sand castle. Peter was so compliant to him, so willing, so cooperative, so playful, so _fun_. Nathan was an idiot. And an asshole. And he'd deserved worse than he'd gotten.

He grabbed Peter's ass and yanked him into himself, buried to the hilt with every stroke, thrusting against him like he wanted to fall inside of him and suddenly he was coming, his hands shaking a little against Peter's hips, his buttocks flexing a few more times for good measure as he panted and relaxed.

"Ah, shit. You're fucking good!" He panted. "I love you." He pulled out slowly and massaged Peter's butt a little, thinking he'd skipped this part the day before when he'd rubbed him all over. Now he made up for it. Peter came up to all fours, looking back at Sylar's impromptu feelie.

"What are you doing?"

"Trying to… I don't know. Make you happy, I guess." Sylar quit touching him obsessively and spared a hand to pull up his own shorts. "What do you want me to do? Can I do you? Somehow?"

"Tonight. In bed."

"It's not like I haven't noticed, you know," Sylar said carefully, not sure how Peter would take it.

"Noticed what?"

"Today. That you've only done me. You're not getting off on this yourself." Sylar reached down between Peter's legs and caressed his balls, touching his shaft. It was full but not hard. He bent over Peter and wrapped an arm around to stroke him gently.

Peter sighed and shifted against him, rubbing back against his body. "You did me yesterday out on the beach, you know," he said almost conversationally.

Sylar could feel Peter hardening though. _So, I'm going to get to turn him on when I want, not just when he decides to let me? Hm. _He smiled. He kissed the sunburned letters, tonguing them slowly. Peter arched his back more abruptly, breathing faster. Sylar pumped him more aggressively. "Yeah, I know. I want to do you again. Your master… your owner… wants to see you come." He sucked at the burn, making Peter whimper. It probably hurt, but Peter didn't pull away.

"Come on," Sylar crooned to him, taking a break from mauling his back with his tongue. "Come on, pet. My Peter pet. You feel so hot in my hand, so good, so hard, so ready. I want you to take me tonight. I want you in me. I never want to have anyone else in me. I want you to ruin me for other men. I think you already have, but I want it every way with you. Every way. You're all I need - all I need."

Peter shoved back into him jerkily, making little "oh" noises until they went up in pitch, shortened and contracted until he came with a squeak. Sylar rubbed his hand up and down Peter's shaft even after he came, feeling him quiver with the sensation but not objecting to it. Sylar leaned away and planted a kiss on his ass, then pulled up Peter's shorts most the way. Peter finished the job.

"You came on my sand castle, pet."

Peter looked down at the spots of wet sand and ejaculate. "Huh. I saw, I conquered, I came."


	4. More Than Words

**A/N: Yay! Two people giving me reviews. You should know - I'm publishing this stuff solely due to reviews. I would have stopped after Slave Verse 1 if it weren't for reviews and requests.**

Peter looked back at Sylar and grinned after his comment, rocking back on his knees. Sylar pulled him over backwards into his arms, absolutely thrilled at the helpless, surprised noise Peter made. Sylar pressed his lips to Peter's and ran his tongue along them. Peter opened willingly and he breached his mouth a little at a time, playing with his lips with his tongue rather than plunging in his mouth. Peter relaxed in his arms, bringing up one hand to fist into Sylar's hair. When they came apart, Sylar kissed his chin and his cheek, making Peter smile lovingly at him. He pushed him back upright.

They took a dip in the ocean and then moved their building efforts down the beach a bit. Hours later, the sand castle was enormous and sprawling. They were arguing over whether Michael Jackson had ever been worthwhile as a musician when the supply boat showed up on the horizon. Peter caught sight of it first.

After pointing it out to Sylar he said, "These are just locals and it's unlikely they'll ever talk to anyone, but they probably have an idea what the president of the US looks like. He's supposed to be here." He stopped there, watching Sylar to see if the other man got it.

Sylar did. "You're saying… I should look like Nathan."

"If you would," Peter said evenly, not pushing it.

"Huh." Sylar thought about his impromptu, internal Nathan-bashing a few hours earlier while he was buried in Peter's ass. Yeah, that had been cathartic. Very much so. "Sure."

Peter looked surprised. A moment later, Sylar shifted and looked down at himself. He wiggled his toes, moved his knees, examined his hands and fingers. He suspected he was going to have to stay in this shape a lot. If he understood correctly, he was going to assume the role of Nathan Petrelli, President of the United States, upon their return from the vacation. Peter would still be Peter.

He looked at the darker haired man, who was regarding him with an oddly reserved expression. "So," Sylar said. "This is your plan for me ruling the world? I've got to look like this giant asshole and you get to look gorgeous like you normally do?"

Peter snorted and gave him a tight smile. "I think this might end up being easier for you than for me."

Sylar gave him a look of mock outrage. "Are you saying it's _easy_ for me to be a walking douchebag?"

Peter opened his mouth, but nothing came out. Sylar grinned, happy to have made him speechless. He pulled out the waistband of his shorts and examined Nathan's endowments shamelessly.

In a very tense voice, Peter said, "I'm not going to have sex with you looking like that."

Sylar let the waistband snap back. "Don't worry. I don't want to either. I'd be a little worried if you _did_. Since I only plan on having sex with you _**in private**_, it shouldn't be an issue what I look like."

Peter relaxed at that, like a weight had been lifted from him. Sylar thought that was a little weird, since Peter clearly didn't have any problems with being public, but whatever. Maybe it was just the no-sex-with-Nathan thing.

The boat arrived and they picked up their supplies. Sylar could tell his new face was recognized. No one said anything of it though, which was fine with him. They carried their stuff up to the bungalow and the boat headed off, not to return for two days. Sylar shed Nathan's face. They unloaded.

Their goods had come mainly in two large ice chests filled to capacity. In one the ice was in blocks, which they transferred to their icebox. As they sorted and put things away, they talked about wrestling. That led to talking about professional wrestling, which led to a discussion of sports as entertainment, which led to an argument about baseball.

Peter had strong feelings about baseball. It was a sport and a contest, played by rules and requiring coordination as a team, reliance on one another and frequent communication between the positions. Sylar saw it as just another kind of performance art and although the outcome might not be as staged as professional wrestling, the rules were there to keep people from _actually_ testing their skills against one another in any direct fashion, making it meaningless as a contest. And he thought it was boring, though he supposed it achieved its purpose as entertainment for those who liked that kind of thing. He said as much.

He hadn't expected his point of view to set Peter off quite like it did.

Peter walked over and grabbed him by the hair, which was sort of out of the blue and it _hurt_. "So you think rules aren't a good idea, huh?" Before Sylar could answer, the world shifted around them and they were in the bedroom.

Sylar blinked, glanced around and knocked Peter away from him, losing some hair in the process. He was starting to get angry. Peter did not get to manhandle him. That wasn't allowed. Teleporting him around was not right, either, but this was probably what Peter was trying to get at. Peter grabbed at him again, just getting his shoulder for a moment before Sylar pulled away from that too. Peter followed up, "Do you think the only _real_ contests people have are all-out fights? That it's somehow not real unless someone gets killed?"

Peter gave up on trying to get a hold of him and used telekinesis to pick Sylar up bodily and throw him on the bed, on his back. Sylar bared his teeth and only said, "Peter?" in a warning tone. He could retaliate, but he wasn't sure it was called for. Peter was skating next to that line, but he hadn't quite crossed it. Sylar looked back and forth across the bed, unsure of the subtext. Was this rough foreplay? Or was Peter really this pissed about that bread-and-circuses crack he'd made about the national pastime?

Apparently Peter just wanted to make his point. "It's an argument, Sylar." He came to the base of the bed and looked down on him, waiting a beat while his temper cooled. "It's an argument. Sports are like a big argument. And there are rules for that, just like there are rules for when people have an argument."

Peter reached down and touched Sylar's foot, stroking slowly across the top of it. He watched how that touch made Sylar lift his chin and relax his mouth and take a deeper breath - all signs of receptiveness, even if his face was otherwise still angry. Peter put his knee on the bed, using the telekinesis to spread Sylar's legs in front of him. Sylar blinked several times and his face lost the anger. _So it's foreplay_. It was working.

Peter said more softly, "We have to know how to disagree. We have to know how to argue and how far we can push each other. We have to be able to trust each other to follow the rules, because we're on a team, Sylar - you and me. You're not alone anymore." He climbed on the bed and released the telekinesis.

"Actually I kind of liked that, Peter. You want to do it that way?" Sylar asked in a completely different tone of voice, an eager passion making his voice deeper. He felt the unseen force creep over him again.

"You like that?" Peter asked, making sure it was the TK he was asking for.

Sylar nodded, making a mental note to save arguments about baseball for when he wanted really, really hot sex. _Baseball. I would have never guessed._ Peter reached up and pulled off his shorts, bringing his legs together enough to get them off, then spreading Sylar again. He shed his own clothes and climbed on the bed. Sylar jerked at his invisible restraints. Peter looked him over to be sure he was only testing and not freaking out, but Sylar seemed very happy about his situation.

"Now where was I?" Peter said, leaning over Sylar's stomach and licking the soft skin under his belly button. "Oh yeah. It's the principle of the thing. We don't exist on this world so we can beat each other up. We're here to be together." He ran his tongue into the divot of Sylar's navel, licking at it and enjoying how Sylar twitched with each probe of his tongue.

After a bit of that, he went on, "Sports are just like any other social interaction. We set up rules so we won't get hurt, so we," he licked down one side of Sylar's shaft, making him mewl with pleasure, "so we can do this over and over. So we're not killing each other, so we're not tearing each other up." He licked up the other side.

Peter raised himself and called the personal lubricant he'd added to the supplies list. Sylar had seen it when they'd unpacked and had been unsure whether to be embarrassed or pleased. He'd settled on both. Now Peter slicked his fingers and rubbed them into Sylar's ass, being a little sloppy with it as he watched his partner's face, watched him blink and shift and breathe faster. Peter pulled his fingers away without inserting anything. He smiled a little because Sylar looked disappointed.

Peter crawled up his body, starting at his navel again and working up, giving light kisses and tastes followed by nips. He nuzzled one nipple, teasing over it without quite touching it with his tongue or lips. Sylar pulled harder against the force that held him spread-eagled on the bed. He threw his head back and fought it with every muscle in his body, pulling for all he was worth in one hard effort after another. He wasn't squirming, just pulling. Peter leaned up and studied his face again, but Sylar was reveling in the confinement.

"It's not a performance art," Peter said, reaching up to roll Sylar's nipple between his thumb and forefinger, watching how it came erect and stood up from his chest like a tiny nub. "Or maybe it is, but it's an interaction. We're learning from each other. We're playing with each other. We don't have to hurt. I'm not saying there isn't a point to winning and the goal of the contest isn't for one side to win and the other lose, but there _**is**_ a point that who wins and who loses isn't as important as the game itself." He kissed Sylar's chest and looked up at him. "Do you see that?"

"Peter, I agree with anything and everything you want me to agree with right now." Sylar's voice was thick, his breathing hard.

Peter gave an 'oh well' expression and abandoned the lecture. He'd lost his audience and he had no one to blame for that but himself. So he put his mouth to Sylar's nipple, pressing his body to him lower down so Sylar's cock was digging into his stomach. He rocked himself against him, sucking hard. When he switched to the other side, he put his hand down between them and gently stroked himself first, then Sylar.

"Oh God." Sylar started shifting his hips into Peter's hand, then suddenly found himself locked down there too so he couldn't move at all. He whined in shameless need. He could only lie there and be caressed far too tenderly and slowly for his tastes. "Oh Peter… Peter… Can't you go a little faster?" he begged.

Peter lifted himself up, still playing almost idly with Sylar's member, which was rock hard. "I could, but I don't think that's what my master _really_ wants me to do. You wouldn't be this hard if you didn't like it this way."

"I do, but…" Sylar just put his head back and whimpered.

Peter grinned and moved himself up so he could lick along that neck, abrading his tongue on the stubble. Another thing he'd added to the list, and had delivered, was a shaving razor and cream. They hadn't used it yet. Since it wasn't kind on the tongue, he went to biting, softly pulling at the skin with his teeth and letting it slip between them when he pulled away. He humped his groin slowly, teasingly, against Sylar's, making him whimper again and make another set of full-body efforts to break free.

"Oh God, Peter, I can't move."

"I _know_," Peter purred. He moved over Sylar's face and jerked his head back when Sylar tried to force a kiss on him. "No." Peter raised his brows and waited until Sylar put his head back, panting and flushed. Then he said, "Lie there quietly and I'll kiss you. Otherwise, you go without."

Sylar keened again with lust and arousal. Peter waited a moment more, letting Sylar's eyes plead for him, before bending to caress his lips with a bare brush of his own. Sylar shivered under him, his muscles pulling unevenly against the force. Peter kissed him again, but only let their lips touch, no more. He pulled back for a moment. Sylar's breathing was ragged, his eyes focused on something only he could see.

Peter let his tongue slather over Sylar's lips, tasting him. Sylar's mouth was open for him, beseeching and gasping. Peter finally turned his head and placed his firmly over the other man's, letting his tongue slide across the other. Hot semen spurted between them.

Peter pulled back. The orgasm was kind of surprising, because there was no jerking of the hips or other motion to indicate Sylar's passion. His eyes were rolled back some and his mouth slack, every muscle tense and now slowly relaxing. "Guess you _really_ like that."

Sylar didn't say anything articulate. He just kept saying, "oh" over and over, panting. Peter rocked back on his knees and lifted Sylar's legs. He pulled over a pillow and jammed it under the other man's buttocks.

"You're…?" Sylar said, his tone questioning even if he couldn't get the query out. After a moment to catch his breath, he answered himself too with, "Yeah, please. Go ahead."

Peter moved into position. He'd relaxed nearly all the telekinesis, but Sylar was too spent to move. Peter said, "I love you," not just because he meant it, but to hear Sylar's tone and judge his mood when he replied.

Sylar nodded. "You too. God that was good."

Peter smiled and heard what he wanted to hear. He began to push himself against the other man. He'd lubed his member too. It pressed in and Sylar's body yielded uncertainly before him, relaxed for a moment, then tense, a moment of attempted relaxation, then tense again. Peter moved himself back and forth against Sylar, being patient.

After a moment, Sylar's brows knit and he looked up. "You're not… um. Why aren't you doing it?"

"I was hoping you'd help me out. I can push into you, but it will hurt."

"I'm not made of glass, Peter."

"I know. I don't fuck you to hurt you. Push down." He waited a moment, nudging Sylar's body until the other man found the right muscles to flex and let him in.

"Oh! Yeah, that kind of burns. Didn't so much last time."

"It's okay. I'm in. It'll fade. I'd worked you more with my fingers last time."

Sylar panted and nodded. "Did you mean all those things you said to Nathan about me?"

Peter grinned. "Insecure about your first time?" He pushed into him a little harder, a little faster, in short, shallow jerks.

"Uh… yeah."

"You were _wonderful_, Sylar. Everything I said about being with you was the truth. You don't see me having any problems right now, do you?"

"No. Just… worry. Ung."

Peter had got his whole length into him, which provoked a series of helpless noises and squirms from the other man. "This position lets me in deeper than I was last time. You'll get used to it. Try to ride it out. Let me drive. And let me know if it's too much." Sylar nodded and Peter started flexing back and forth, pumping into him in steady strokes. He clasped one of Sylar's thighs to himself, turning his head to kiss the leg, then lick it and bite. Sylar made a pleased, surprised noise and Peter started going into him harder still.

Peter let the sensation wash over him as he fucked Sylar. He drug his teeth along the leg he held and let it fold down his lip as he licked him and sucked him. He loved the taste. It was Sylar. Only Sylar. Every person tasted unique and this… he tasted of salt and sea and sand and sun, but most of all he tasted of Sylar. Peter buried himself inside the man time after time until he spasmed and came.

He relaxed and pulled out slowly. Sylar shuddered.

"Oh, that's the best part, I think."

"What?" Peter said, still a bit fogged.

"When you pull out. That's… great." Sylar gave him a very satisfied smile. "You can keep that leg if you want." Peter looked at the limb he was still hugging to himself. "You seem to have fallen in love with it. I'm pretty sure you've been cheating on me with it. You can marry it if you want, but we'll need to have an open relationship. You can have it on the weekends." He laughed. "I think…" He was still breathing a little harder than normal. "I think the analogy ran out on me."

"Ha. I think the analogy divorced you." Peter grinned and put Sylar's leg down carefully. From Sylar's wince, as Peter had expected, it cramped up when he lowered it. "Sorry."

"S'okay."

Peter readjusted the pillows, then crawled up next to Sylar and cuddled up to him. "Can I sleep next to you tonight?"

"Sure. Why not?" Sylar bit his tongue right after he said it, remembering that just the night before he hadn't been able to stand having Peter on him in bed, thinking too much of how Peter had held him back for a moment when the goon squad had broken into his apartment. Peter was silent. Sylar bent and placed a kiss on the top of Peter's head. "I forgive you. It's okay." After a moment he chuckled and said in a whisper, "You're a good slave."

Peter smiled, but he still didn't speak. He just hugged Sylar more firmly and let that say more than words. Eventually, they fell asleep.


	5. Poisoned

**A/N: Many of the incidents I recount here in Peter's life are drawn from Trekker's fanfic of Peter/Nathan. She had a lot of stories involving them and I've used them liberally to populate this AU. You can find them at **http:/ unexpectedplaces dot us **(assuming FFn allows the link to come through, you'll need to remove the spaces and use a period for "dot"). It's weird that so much of what she had Nathan doing seemed hot and sexy in her stories, but when you step back and actually think about what kind of person would really **_**do**_** that… and what effect it would have on Peter… ew.**

**Oh, and because I've been thinking about the fact that I haven't given warnings on my fics lately, here's some warnings: Mentions of child sexual abuse and underage sex, mentions of sexual abusiveness, lack of actual sex in the chapter, bad language. (It feels silly to give warnings at this point. If you've read this far… sheesh.)**

"So… your plan is for me to look like Nathan most of the time and assume the role of president, right?"

"Right." Peter sounded distracted, but he was probably paying more attention to Sylar than to what he was doing.

Sylar wasn't real sure _what_ Peter was doing. They were both hanging in the air near the tops of the palm trees on the island and Peter was looking over the foliage very carefully. "I'm going to need to know how he acts," Sylar said.

Peter grunted and didn't say anything, so Sylar went on, "For example, do I get to kiss you?"

Peter's head came up, peeking over the patch of fronds he was sorting through. "As Nathan?"

"Yes," Sylar said. Peter stared at him for a long while, so Sylar added, "It doesn't have to be yes, Peter."

Peter went back to his task, whatever that was. "Yes, you can." His voice was a little terse, but not enough to put Sylar off. It did make him uncertain.

"Well… it's just… I didn't know… what with the way he… Does… Did he ever show you affection?"

"Yeah." Peter moved on to a different tree, relaxing again.

Sylar stroked his chin. He needed a shave, badly. It was on the day's agenda, but right after gentle, languorous and fantastic morning sex that Peter hadn't been terribly into but had put up with, had come breakfast and right after breakfast Peter had been looking at one of the pamphlets while Sylar cleaned up the kitchen and then Peter had lifted off the balcony without explanation and Sylar had followed him and here he was - looking for something in the trees.

Sylar asked, "Was it ever real?"

Peter looked up at him, his eyes narrowing slightly. Sylar met his gaze with a blank, open expression. He wasn't sure if he had a right to this information, but Peter knew _everything_ about him - not just his memories like Charlene could pull up, but his thoughts and feelings about those memories. Sylar hadn't reciprocated that little empathy power of Lydia's because frankly, he wasn't sure he could handle what he'd see. It was better to take it in small doses, verbally.

"It was always real, Sylar," Peter said quietly, moving down to the overlapping, almost woven bark of the palm tree and beginning to examine the crevices carefully.

"Real? People don't… they don't do that sort of stuff to people they love."

"Didn't say he loved me. I said it was real. Though he loved me too."

Sylar exhaled sharply, wondering what the difference was and doubly wondering what the difference was if, as Peter said, they were both true. "When did it start?"

Peter slapped at his side, then looked down at some bug that had landed on him. He brushed it off. "When did what start? Him loving me? Probably when I was born."

"No." Sylar looked away and then back. "I mean when did he start… abusing you? Sexually."

Peter started to run his hand through his hair, then thought better of it and wiped off his hand a little more thoroughly on the bark in case it still had dead bug on it. "That's… you know, that's really open to interpretation. I guess clinically it started when I was twelve, when he talked to me about the birds and bees and he jacked me off."

"Wha-?" Sylar blinked and caught himself, then asked anyway, "Um… wait, what?"

Peter looked over at him and didn't bother to repeat himself. Sylar had heard him clearly. He just didn't understand.

Peter explained, "There was some touching and the occasional tease until I was fifteen. Then I finally got him to have sex with me. He was kind of drunk at one of mom and dad's parties. I was too. He blew me. That's all I wanted, but by the end of that he was pretty worked up and it's not like I put up much of a fuss until he had me down. Even then I wasn't going to get him in trouble." Peter shrugged like this was old news. But he'd stopped whatever it was he'd been doing with the trees. He was just staring off into the distance now.

"How long did that go on? I mean… did you… just stay away from him after that?"

"Stay away from him?" Peter laughed. "I was fucking fifteen, Sylar. If you'd had someone when you were fifteen who would suck you off and fuck you, would you have stayed away?"

"But… didn't he hurt you?"

"Fuck no. I mean, yeah, sometimes, but not bad. He wouldn't leave marks, after all. We didn't have abilities. It was just normal fooling around."

Sylar considered the inadvisability of saying what was on his mind: _Normal fooling around doesn't include screwing your brother, or getting screwed by him, when you're fifteen and he's twenty-seven._ And so he just hung in the air silently with a disapproving look on his face.

Peter huffed and went back to searching the leaves at the top of the trees, digging around at the base of the fronds where they joined the trunk. He kept talking though. "We kept in touch while I was in college and then nursing school. He'd come by or I'd look him up. We used hotels, mostly. Then there was that time in his car in the parking garage." Peter chuckled. "I was in drag. That was so hot."

Peter wasn't looking at Sylar, so he didn't see him clench his teeth and tense so much that his hands shook. His silence apparently encouraged Peter to go on. "He had me break up with a guy once while he was fucking me. Poor Scott. He really didn't deserve that, but Nathan always was an ass."

"Wait… just wait. You were having sex with someone and Nathan barged in and made you break up with him?"

Peter looked back over his shoulder at Sylar and laughed. "No… um… no." He shook his head and breathed out, then said, "I was dating Scott. Nathan got jealous, so he tied me up, fucked _me,_ called Scott on the phone and had me break up with him. While he was fucking me."

Sylar was silent again. All the moreso because Peter honestly seemed to think that was funny and endearing of Nathan, rather than psychotic. He was beginning to have second thoughts about being with Peter, though he didn't entertain them very seriously. He suspected the relationship might not be… healthy. Then again, he was a serial killer, so was it really right to judge?

While he was pondering that, Peter's mood shifted to morose. He said, "I think that was when it started. That's what you were really asking for, wasn't it? He started to get real controlling after that - not just who I could see, but what I could wear and where I could go." He shook his head and sighed. "I finished nursing school, but just barely. There was all that crap with his senate election. When he learned he could fly, that kind of put him off for a while and I didn't see him much during his campaign. Then I got my ability."

Peter was silent for a while, his eyes dull. "He came back for me, there at Kirby Plaza. I wish he hadn't. Even though I know I wouldn't have died and a lot of other people would have… I owed him after that. He never let me forget it. I think you were dead at the time, so I don't think you saw him. Or whatever it was that happened to you."

Peter turned and his brows furrowed. "Whatever happened to you there, anyway?"

"I don't want to talk about it," Sylar said quietly, still trying to figure out what to do with this information about Peter's life. On the positive side, if Peter was willing to put up with Nathan, then it kind of explained why pairing up with someone like Sylar wasn't that disagreeable to him.

Peter looked distracted for a moment and Sylar realized that between Lydia's empathy ability and his eidetic memory, Peter could figure out anything he wanted to know about Sylar whenever he wanted. A few moments later Peter said, "Huh," and went back to his search in the tree. Sylar frowned at him.

Peter said, "We didn't agree on stuff - Nathan and I. It was a kind of philosophical thing. We fought around for the next year or so while all that other crap went down - the early stuff. After he killed dad… you knew that, right?"

Sylar nodded. He had his sources for information. Peter went on, "So after that I had ability draining too and… I don't know," he waved one arm in an exaggerated, juvenile expression of drama, "I got depressed about the family and everything and what I'd become. Nathan kept me drugged up most of the time and I thought it was because I couldn't always control my powers, but really I couldn't control my powers because I was stoned so much. Once I got away, it started to clear up, but I was addicted pretty hard to that crap he'd been giving me. Took a while to shake it. I still want it sometimes.

"Then he got in charge of Homeland Security and I tried to fight him. You know how that went." Actually, Sylar didn't, but he was listening carefully. "It was once he got me in that camp that it really went bad. He was having a lot of trouble holding it all together and he thought I would help him… if I was just properly motivated. And controlled. I guess, because of all the stuff he'd done to me before, with the sex and the relationships and the drugs, that it wasn't that big of a deal to have Kelly come in and give me mental commands to obey him, not to hurt him, not to betray him, put his needs above my own, that sort of crap.

"It just seemed like- ow!" He jerked his hand back and bent forward to see what had hurt him. Peter examined his hand for a moment, then went back to checking the old, dead fronds he'd been sorting through. "It just seemed like prudent stuff to do. Made sense. And that was pretty much how he got to be president. For a while he had me drain people's abilities as they came in and they kept a lid on it, pretending to the public that abilities didn't exist, because after anyone saw me, they didn't. That had a _**whole**_ lot to do with him becoming president. I thought I was helping. I mean, they were still alive, right? And after I drained them, they were free, right?"

Sylar said nothing. He'd heard a great deal of Peter using his abilities in this way. He'd never judged it and he didn't now. He'd assumed Peter was doing it to deny him victims, but he supposed it was possible Peter had motivations that didn't revolve around himself.

"California was my fault," Peter said, a sad, hollow note to his voice. Sylar tilted his head in confusion. Peter explained, "Samuel started saying he'd kick my ass and he had this mob of specials to help him do it. Nathan had me alter the guy's girlfriend so she dumped him and he… well, Samuel kind of overreacted. That wasn't the only thing Nathan had done to set him off, but it was enough. After the thing with California, Samuel's allies all dropped him like a hot rock and I took him out. Once they were split up, we went after them piecemeal."

Sylar blinked. It was close to the story he'd heard, but he hadn't known Nathan or Peter had had a role in provoking Samuel. For obvious reasons, that part hadn't been offered for public consumption. He thought about what he'd do if someone stole Peter from him. He felt an uncomfortable sympathy for Samuel. Still, he offered, "If he did it, then it's not your fault."

"Yes, it is. There were other things I could have done. There's always been… other things I could have done." Peter exhaled and gave Sylar an angry look through narrowed eyes. Sylar's brows drew together, not understanding what he'd done to deserve the hairy eyeball.

Peter scowled and turned away from him, leaning forward and putting his face closer to the vegetation. "There it is." He picked up some small, wriggling creature with telekinesis. Sylar drifted closer. Peter lowered the insect onto his hand. The second it touched his skin, he vanished. Sylar blinked at the suddenly empty space where Peter had been.

"Peter?" _That was stupid_, he thought. _He's gone. He can't hear me. _"Damnit." He didn't think Peter had gone anywhere important, but he was gone regardless and Sylar had actually been really interested in the conversation. Or the monologue. _Maybe I should have been saying more?_ He'd heard bits and pieces from different people about Peter's role in things, but to hear it direct from the source was much more reliable.

Sylar internally scrolled through his abilities, looking for the one that had originally belonged to Molly Walker. He found it, used it, and determined that Peter had gone no further than the interior of the bungalow.

Sylar flew down. "What are you doing?" Peter had a bowl out and was looking at the tiny creature inside of it. Sylar looked too. It wasn't an insect - it was an arachnid. A scorpion, specifically. It was reddish brown and about an inch long. It looked pissed, if the agitated motions it was making were any indication.

Peter's expression was much harder to read. His voice was uninflected as he said, "The brochure said the venom from one of these can kill a man in twelve hours." He looked at his finger. It was beginning to swell noticeably. "Hurts like a bitch."

"Peter!" Sylar reached out and took Peter's hand, looking at it with concern. "Heal it."

Peter gave a smug, self-satisfied smile and said simply, "No."


	6. Treatment

**A/N: Sorry it took me so long to get this finished. I had it done four days ago, but it was very different than it is now. I didn't like it, so I didn't publish, which I think was the right thing to do. It ended up much better. I have the next chapter written too, but I got up at 5 am and I think I'll take a nap before publishing it. Give you folks a chance to read this one before the next.**

"Besides," Peter said, "I thought you liked hurting me." There was an odd gleam in Peter's eye. Perhaps it was angry or stand-offish. Sylar couldn't tell.

He frowned and took Peter's hand in his own again and looked at it. He'd been stung on the index finger of the right hand - a really nasty place to get it. The finger was hot and red, the skin starting to get that shiny look of swollen tissue. He ran his fingers over it lightly, watching Peter's face. He saw the tightening around the eyes, but no other reaction. Peter's pain tolerance had never been in question, though.

"Peter," he said gently. "I might like hurting you, but that's if _**I**_ am hurting you. On purpose. And I'm in control, so it goes exactly as far as I want it to and no further. Because that's what it is: control. It's about power. Just seeing you hurt is…" He shook his head. "That's not power. It's just you hurt. It's one of my things getting damaged. I don't want to see that. Please. Heal it." Despite the nature of his words being about objectification, Sylar's tone conveyed that he was genuinely upset to see Peter hurt.

One side of Peter's mouth quirked up at that hidden sentiment, but his eyes were dead. "Nathan liked to see me in pain."

Sylar looked at him blankly until he realized why Peter was saying that. He was casting Sylar in the role of Nathan, inviting or expecting him to be what Nathan had been to him. "I am **not** Nathan." His voice was so low and angry that Peter flinched from it and might have withdrawn, but Sylar still had his hand held firmly in his own.

Peter blinked and sucked in air. He raised his chin and set his feet apart in that old defiance. "I'm not healing it," he said stubbornly, like a teenager standing up to a strict parent. "That would take the sunburn off my back."

Sylar's mouth opened, then closed. He made a scoffing noise. "Peter… that's… it's not that important."

Now it was Peter's turn to look thrown. "What? Like hell that isn't important to you! The first thing you did with me when you got me home was stick that tracking implant in me. You tagged me like a fucking _dog_. The thing that pissed you off the most with Nathan wasn't what he was doing, but that he was doing it to someone who belonged to _you_. You're the exact same as Nathan."

"I am _**not!**_" Sylar sputtered. Rage surged through him at the unfair comparison. Or at least… he thought it was unfair. Wasn't it? "You little shit!"

Peter laughed at him, right in his face. Sylar had never wanted to deck someone so much in his life… and yet not done it. "I can hold you down and write that on you with a permanent marker if I want to, Peter. It's not going to _kill_ you!"

Peter shrugged with exaggerated indifference. "Neither will this."

"You said it would!"

"No, I said it does sometimes. It's not _automatically_ fatal. Weren't you listening to me when I was reading that to you yesterday?"

Sylar's grip tightened on Peter's hand. "Is that what this is about? My attention wandered for a moment and so you're going to poison yourself as revenge against me?"

Peter smiled patronizingly. "Maybe. What are you going to do about it, _master?_"

Sylar glared at him. Peter snorted to show how little that scared him and yanked his hand away. Sylar grabbed his forearm and Peter punched him squarely in the nose with everything he had. Sylar was knocked back on his ass, seeing stars for a few seconds before he healed. When he looked up, Peter had moved in to stand over him. "How do you like that, huh?" Peter taunted him.

Sylar shoved him back with telekinesis, knocking Peter into the dining area and nearly to the balcony. The taller man used the moment to regain his feet.

"Oh, no," Peter said, recovering faster. "Don't you even." His body glowed, power shining through his skin and he hung in the air about a foot above the floor.

Sylar held his ground, a lot uncertain about what was going to happen next. He could feel the radiation Peter was giving off, but the nuclear reaction had ramped up lightning fast and then stabilized. There were a few things that could kill him. Getting vaporized was one of them. Oddly, it ran through his mind that if Peter was going to kill him, he'd rather he did it somewhere else. This place had too many good memories. And he realized he'd precipitated the situation that was giving it a bad one. He took a deep breath, held it for a moment, then let it out. "Rules. Okay. I get it."

"Do you?" Peter said, his words clipped.

"Yes, _I get it_," Sylar answered, angry but under control. "I shouldn't have shoved you like that." He looked away for a moment, then back at Peter, meeting his eyes. "It was wrong. Now stop it. You're scorching the damn floor."

Peter blinked, nodded shallowly and his almost-painful-to-look-at brilliance faded. He settled back to the floor and a moment later he looked like a normal human being. He shot Sylar sullen, angry looks though. He looked likely to explode in an entirely non-literal fashion, even if he'd backed down from an _actual_ explosion. Peter was certainly in a mood.

"Listen Peter, just heal the finger, okay?"

"Fuck you! Why don't you just leave me the fuck alone? Why are you even still here?"

Sylar stared at him, dumbfounded.

Peter carried on, gesturing widely, sarcastically, "I mean, you got what you wanted. What do you need me for?"

All Sylar could think was that this was exactly like all of Peter's other lightning fast emotional shifts. He was pretty sure those meant something, but he had no idea what that was. Oddly, Peter's childish behavior reminded Sylar starkly that he was an adult here and responding in kind to Peter's drama was not the right course of action.

He gave it a few seconds, breathing slowly and deeply, mastering his emotions. When he thought he was in command of himself, he walked straight over to Peter, exuding every bit of dominance and 'I'm in control here' body language he could. Peter reacted to it like Sylar thought he would, like he always had before: he got his back up, he stiffened and tensed and stuck his chin out stubbornly but he didn't actually do anything. At least, not until Sylar touched him.

Sylar grabbed him by the arm and Peter swung at him again. Sylar had expected that and blocked most of it with his other arm. They had a brief scuffle. Peter hit him several times and Sylar took the blows unflinchingly (because unlike Peter, he healed), which allowed him to accomplish his objective. He got hold of Peter by the neck and shoved him into the wall. After a moment of tense stillness, Peter tried to shove off the wall and they fought again. Sylar got Peter's arm twisted behind his back and flattened him against the barrier once more.

This time he spoke as soon as Peter quit fighting. "Stop it, Peter. You **have** to stop this. One of us is going to lose our temper again and do something we can't take back. If this keeps up, it's going to be me and I will be _so sorry_." Peter had remained still to listen to him. At the end he slumped a little, defeated.

Sylar wrapped his hand around Peter's neck, his long-fingered grip tightening painfully and pulling him over to a chair. He put him in it. "Stay there." He went to the bar and pulled over the stack of papers. He sorted through them quickly, angling his body so Peter was in his peripheral vision. He found what he wanted: the pamphlet that warned about dangerous local wildlife.

He opened it to the part on scorpions. There were six different pictures, all of fairly low quality. He looked at the one in the bowl that was struggling vainly to climb up the slick sides. He had no idea what kind it was. He recalled Peter had only mentioned one type of treatment, so perhaps they all had the same effects. He skimmed past the descriptions of the beasties to find that section.

He honestly had not paid attention when Peter was talking about it because it had never occurred to Sylar that it mattered. They could both regenerate. The idea that one of them would be so passive aggressive as to _refuse_ to heal hadn't been in his mind. He read it quickly, not going past the part about what to do if shock set in. If that happened, he'd read the rest.

"Okay." He put the paper down and went back to Peter. "Come on. Up." He hauled him up and brought him to the sink. Peter dug in his heels and resisted, but since he didn't actually fight, Sylar just drug him over there by force. Peter pouted, lower lip sticking out and everything. Sylar refrained from drawing attention to how juvenile Peter was acting, which he thought took a great deal of restraint.

Sylar washed Peter's hand under cold water. He chilled a clean wet washcloth and wrapped it around the finger. He got the first aid kit off the wall and found an appropriate ointment. He unwrapped the towel and applied it, then chilled the towel again and rewrapped it. Peter stood there silently, watching Sylar as he worked. He'd stopped being petulant after Sylar got down the first aid kit and had shifted to considering.

Sylar got out Benedryl, Tylenol and a glass of water. He put them in front of Peter and ordered him, "Take these."

Peter picked up the pills and gave Sylar an odd look. "It matters to you?"

"Yes, Peter," Sylar said, exasperated. "It matters."

"What'll you do if I don't?"

"Peter…" Sylar gritted his teeth and looked heavenward. He took a deep breath again. It wasn't enough, so he took another. "Peter, I will worry about you and be upset. I'll bother you about it until it's clear you're going to be fine. And if my concern for you doesn't matter _to you_, then…" He shook his head. "Then I'm going to think long and hard about what that means for how you feel about me."

Peter took the pills. Afterwards, he put the glass down. "Why didn't you just make me heal?"

"What? How?"

"I don't know," he said, shrugging. "I'm sure you could have thought of something."

Sylar blinked at him. "Why…" He narrowed his eyes, not liking where this was going. "Is this some sort of kinky sex game?"

Peter snorted. "No, usually it was just torture. Though sometimes there was sex involved with that too."

Sylar continued to be lost at this. "Are you saying you _want_ me to do something like that to you?"

"No! No. I just… I thought you would. If… you know, if you couldn't make me do what you wanted."

"I'm… Peter, I'm not here to make you do what I want!" He furrowed his brows. That wasn't really right. He _did_ want Peter to do what he wanted. That was kind of the point of all this - to get Peter to do things Sylar wanted him to do. But forcing him to do it… that wasn't the same thing. Or maybe it was. He stood there confused for a beat before shaking it away. He was beginning to lose his cool again.

"I've had enough of this passive aggressive, sulky bullshit, Peter!" Sylar said harshly. "I don't know what you're playing at, but I am **not** going to compete with your dead fucking brother for your affections. If that's what this is about, then there's no reason for me to even be here."

Sylar backed up a step and made a frustrated, impotent gesture. He stalked off to the balcony, leaning against the rail and scowling at the tropical paradise they were in. He didn't like the tightness in his chest, the fury and frustration and disgust that Peter thought Sylar should fall neatly into treating him like Nathan had.

Even more, he didn't like the parallels of how he _was_ treating Peter like Nathan had. Of course he'd intended to exploit the pattern deliberately, but that was before he'd seen it, before he'd been repulsed by really internalizing what he had been doing. He wanted to be better than that. He wanted to be better than that and Peter wasn't letting him.

He heard Peter pad along behind him and pause next to one of the recliners. "Master?"

"What?" Sylar snapped grumpily.

Peter came up behind him and stroked his back. Sylar turned, put his hand in the middle of Peter's chest and pushed him. "Get away from me, Peter. I'm _done_." His voice wasn't angry; it was just supremely uninterested.

The expression on Peter's face became stricken as he realized the implications of Sylar's mood. Sylar not being interested in him was _devastating_ - quite a bit more than Sylar had intended. "No! Please! I'm so sorry." He went to his knees, even though Sylar just rolled his eyes and turned back towards the ocean. "I'm so sorry," Peter murmured. "I shouldn't have done it. I'm sorry. I just wanted… to see if you cared. Please forgive me." He sounded frightened and very sincere.

"Fuck you," Sylar said, but his voice wasn't quite as hard as it had been before. He cursed himself for that weakness. If he could purge that feeling, he knew, he would just teleport out of here and he'd be on his own. Peter was right: he had all of Peter's abilities. He didn't necessarily _need_ Peter. He just wanted him and he didn't want him if he was going to be this way. The way Peter was sniveling on the floor now made him feel guilty and he didn't think he'd done anything _wrong_. It was all Peter's fault, after all. Wasn't it?

Foremost in his mind was how he didn't want to live with someone who would so automatically promise death if he didn't comply. Because yes, while Sylar admitted he shouldn't have pushed him with telekinesis, he also thought Peter shouldn't have responded by threatening to level the whole island. This was the third time Peter had overreacted - breaking his neck for calling him a freak, manhandling and teleporting him because he didn't like his opinion on sports and now this! Sylar fumed.

Sylar watched the distant surf and made a determined effort to yank his thoughts from the what-ifs of Peter going nuclear and all of his lover's missteps and faults. Instead he tried to consider things they'd done that had been pleasant. There'd been a lot of that. He thought about how much he'd enjoyed diving and flying and making sand castles, of all things. He'd liked looking at the stars and kissing and touching and stimulating and responding.

And the sex had been incredible. He'd never let another man have him that way and he was sure Peter had been far more careful and considerate of his amateur status than most others would have been. It wasn't casual, that was for sure. Peter loved him. That was why he was bowing and scraping on the floor. He knew he'd pushed it too far. Peter was just… immature. He behaved like an oversexed fifteen year old - which thought drew Sylar's thinking to what Peter had said about his past. His intuitive aptitude drew a definite connection between the two, but it didn't give him any immediate insight as to how to change things. It wasn't that Peter was broken - he was just changed.

He glanced back. Peter was on the floor, face down in a traditional posture of prostration: bent forward with his forehead on the deck, hands to either side of his head, palms up. It was a lot weird, but so was Peter. Sylar looked away, leaving Peter there for the time being. He was still too angry to deal with it constructively, but he was calming down.

Minutes passed. Peter's complete silence underscored his sincerity. He'd always been patient. Sylar wasn't. He turned and walked past Peter, ignoring him. Peter fell back on their role behavior, crying out desperately, "Master! Please…"

Sylar got the bowl with the scorpion in it. He carried it to the balcony and tossed it off, watching it fall to the ground below, to live for another day. He turned and looked at Peter, who had raised his head to watch. He ducked it again immediately, flattening himself. Sylar walked past him once more.

"I want only to serve you, master," he groveled.

"No, you don't. Cut it out, Peter. I'm not Nathan. If you want to be with Nathan, then… that ship's sailed. It's too late." Peter made a stifled sob. Sylar went on, "You're just fucking shit out of luck." Sylar turned around at the kitchen bar and leaned against it, watching Peter as the smaller man stole glances at him while maintaining his submissive posture.

"I don't want to be with Nathan. I want to be with _you_."

"You fooled me."

"Sylar… please… Please let me be with you. Please. I don't want anyone else." His voice quavered pitifully.

A hot surge of anger flared back up in Sylar's chest as he couldn't hear those words without thinking about Nathan ordering Peter not to fuck anyone without his permission - not to be with anyone, not to want anyone. He walked over to Peter, grabbed him by the hair and pulled him up to his lips, ignoring the pained yelp Peter made and giving him a bruising, angry kiss. He had no idea why he did it, as it wasn't really an answer to the issue.

"What do you want from me?" he asked roughly when he pulled Peter back from him.

For his part, Peter was coiled like a spring - tense all over and trembling. Anger suffused his voice and he answered immediately, "Everything! I want all of you, Sylar, and everything you are. I killed him for _**you**_, damnit! _Don't you see that?_" He pushed forward past the pain of Sylar's grip in his hair, kissing him again.


	7. Absolution

There was way too much going on at the moment for Sylar to deal with it all. He decided to address it in pieces, handling the most important issues first and leaving the rest for later. Sylar let Peter kiss him and ran his hand into his hair more firmly, getting a better grip. Peter made a discontent noise at that and his eyes darted back and forth between Sylar's, trying to divine his meaning and not liking what he was figuring out. Sylar pried him off. Anger and fear battled on Peter's face, his nostrils flaring, breathing hard. He made a sound like a frustrated sob.

"Calm down, Peter." Sylar just held him there and watched. His own emotions were still mixed.

Peter said, his voice low with need, "Please fuck me. Please fuck me, Sylar. Take me, please. I need to know you want me. Please." He wasn't calming down. To the contrary, Sylar's admonishment seemed to make Peter nervous and apprehensive.

Sylar's lips pressed together, but he didn't say anything. He wasn't sure what _to_ say.

Peter blinked and reached out, caressing him uncertainly, rapidly and almost clumsily, his hands still shaking. "I'm sorry I fuck things up. I always fuck things up. I'm so sorry. Please. Please fuck me. Please." He literally had tears in his eyes.

Sylar let him go and Peter was on him in an instant, one hand slipping into his shorts and the other clasping behind him. He clung to him desperately, hungrily kissing his chest and working up his neck. Sylar spoke, his words serious despite his voice becoming thick with the arousal Peter was inflicting on him, "We're still going to talk about this afterwards - just so you know."

"Yes. Fine. But you _have_ to fuck me first." Peter kissed sloppily up Sylar's jaw, to his ear, pressing against him, breathing hard, humping his leg even though it didn't seem like Peter had an erection. He was all over him. It was just too much. Sylar could only imagine this was the sort of behavior that had bred Nathan's stoic disinterest in Peter's approach to him. Sylar had no interest in going down that road. He also needed to get in control of the situation before Peter's eager hands and questing mouth turned him on so much that his own body took control out of his hands. It had happened before, after all.

"No," Sylar said firmly. "You have to fuck _me_, Peter."

"What?" Peter stopped cold, like Sylar had suggested something unspeakably obscene.

_Ha. That worked._ Sylar was a little surprised. "I'm not going to punish you with my dick. If you want sex from me to make you feel better, fine. But you're going to fuck me for it, not the other way around."

Peter pulled back from him like he'd been rejected. He wavered, blinking and uncertain.

"I love you," Sylar said softly, leaning in for a kiss. "Do you want me? It would be the third time you'd topped me." He nuzzled Peter's face not-so-differently from how Peter had done to him. It had always made Sylar feel really good, in control and dominant. Peter had done the same thing to Nathan. Sylar thought about exactly what Peter had done. He bent his knees a little, putting himself lower, changing the angle and nipping at the dark haired man's chin and lower lip. If Peter recognized it, he showed no sign of it. Very likely, it occurred to Sylar, no one had ever turned the tables on him like this.

"Okay," Peter said, obviously still reeling. "Um."

"Bedroom?"

"Yes. Yes. Bedroom." Sylar grinned at how off-balance Peter sounded, perhaps as swept away as Sylar himself had frequently felt with Peter.

Peter led the way and Sylar was pleased at the opportunity to smile behind his back. It wasn't often he got to throw Peter so thoroughly. Peter shucked his shorts at the side of the bed and then climbed on. As Sylar had gathered, Peter might have been all over him, but he wasn't actually aroused. He had been trying to defuse the situation with sex and maybe it truly made him more comfortable to exert power over others that way. Sylar didn't want to be led around by his dick, though.

Peter lay back against the pillow and started stroking himself, looking at Sylar. His breathing was slowing from the hyper-tension of the scene on the balcony. Sylar undressed and stroked himself in turn. After a few moments, he climbed on the bed too, crawling between Peter's legs. He moved forward and tilted his head towards Peter's member as it slowly shifted under his hand. Peter tilted it closer to him, allowing Sylar to more easily do what he was obviously intending. He licked his lips and kissed the head, then ran his tongue across it.

"Mm," Peter said, reaching down with his right hand to stroke Sylar's cheek with his knuckles, curling away his wrapped index finger. Sylar noticed the finger was cool, as if Peter had been, at least, using his cryokinesis to keep it chilled. He was pleased to note that. Peter said, "After this we have to shave."

"After we shave, we have to argue," Sylar rejoined.

"We don't have to argue. I'll act right from now on."

Sylar smiled. "You're not getting off that easy, Peter. You were being a brat."

"Oh? You going to make it _hard_ for me to get off?" Peter teased.

Sylar slipped his mouth over the glans of Peter's cock, tasting the precum and the unique flavor of a man's skin. Peter still smelled like coconut from the shower they'd taken that morning. All of the personal care products in the bungalow were the same scent. Sylar figured by the end of this, he was going to be conditioned to absolutely adore coconut. For now though, he tried to curl his lips over his teeth, but it left him unable to do much of anything except tongue him. He wasn't real sure how to do this part.

Peter tilted himself down a little more and said, "Don't worry about your teeth. Suck harder, get your lips into it. Wrap them around _me_, so your lips are all the way around me." Sylar endeavored to follow the directions. "Hold me there in the middle. Tense them. Tense your lips, Sylar. There. Now up and down, keeping your lips tight. See how that keeps your teeth out of the way? If I wasn't holding steady, you'd want to put your hand on me to make sure I didn't shift and scrape myself on you though. That's more of an issue when your lips get tired."

Sylar pulled off for a moment, actually rather interested in the advice. "What do I do then?"

"Then you do what you just did. Pull off, stroke me, take a break. Or take me deep, but that's a lesson for another time."

Sylar nodded and went back to it. Peter was hardening quickly. One thing Sylar had to admit, this was defusing the hell out of his anger. He sucked him hard, trying varying pressures, and Peter gave him sounds of encouragement or quiet, letting him know what was working and when to move on to something else.

Peter nudged him off after a while, which Sylar was sort of grateful for. His mouth was getting tired and he hadn't even been at it very long. Peter summoned the lube with telekinesis and gestured at Sylar. "If I have to fuck you, then I'm at least going to make you do most of the work. Come get on top of me." Peter, too, had calmed down, at least on the surface.

"Ah, facing you?"

"Yep. Straight people call it cowgirl." He lubed himself up with his left hand. Sylar straddled him, knee-walking forward until he was where he thought he needed to be. Peter took his elbow and urged him forward a bit more. He sent his left between Sylar's legs, smearing him from the start of his ass all the way to his balls, using a ridiculous amount of lube. Sylar didn't complain. He liked the touch. Even more he liked the exploring, probing fingertips.

"Not used to having to use my left," Peter murmured. His right hand stayed on Sylar's hip while one finger of his left began to slide in and out. Sylar leaned forward blindly, his body knowing what it needed to do. The movement put himself further forward and Peter made a happy, crooning noise. He added a second finger for only a few strokes, then pulled out and played with Sylar's butt crack from one end to the other, fondling his balls and caressing them. His fingers inevitably found his opening again and dipped within, one first, then a few quick beats later to make sure he was still open, he added the second, moving more slowly.

"Oh, Peter. Oh… That's good."

Peter shifted upwards to capture a kiss from him. The angle was awkward, but the feel of his lips made it worth it. Peter ran his right hand up to thumb across Sylar's left nipple. He rotated his left, curling his fingers inside of Sylar and stroking the tender, sensitive parts he was seeking. Sylar moaned wantonly. The pressure in his ass was fantastic. He had no idea how many fingers Peter was probing him with by now, but it felt almost unendurably good. And whatever he was touching inside of him…! Sylar's mouth fell open in a pant. Hadn't they been arguing earlier? Fuck it, he thought, shoving himself back on Peter's hand.

He was giving every signal he was ready, so Peter guided him back onto himself, raising his cock so that Sylar was settling over it and on top of it. He moved down, feeling it pressing against his opening, expanding the ring of his anus, silding into him with exquisite slowness. Peter let him settle back a little and then stopped him so that Peter could move against him in tiny pushes, watching his face and body carefully. Sylar was grateful he had such a good partner, so considerate that even after they'd been fighting Peter was assiduous in caring for him.

Sylar was biting his lip, loving the hell out of the tension and anticipation. "God, Peter. You are… the best. I can't imagine a better lover. Thank you. Oh!" Peter gave him a harder prod than his earlier oh-so-gradual motions. He started sliding in and out more, making inch or two pushes rather than half inch. "Oh God," Sylar whined, curling forward.

Peter held him for a moment and then pushed him back up. "Does it hurt?"

"No. Just a little. Burns. Not much though. Oh God it's good. You're in me. It's good!"

Peter shifted him down a little further, starting to exaggerate his motions with his hips. At the same time, he reached down between them with his left and wrapped it firmly around Sylar's cock. Sylar gasped, throwing his head back. His hands gripped Peter's biceps and he pushed himself down the rest of the way as Peter pumped him.

Peter groaned, shoving his hips up to meet him, plunging all the way in. Sylar whimpered, teetering on the edge of just losing it right then. Peter squeezed him hard on the head of his cock and he shuddered, clenching. Peter chuckled.

"Ah! That _hurts_, Peter."

"I know. Stopped you though. I'd rather you stayed with me for a little longer, okay?"

"O-kay," Sylar sounded almost submissive. At the moment, he was, and he didn't care about his tone. Peter was making love to him. All the tension and drama poured away with the sensation of Peter shoving inside him time after time, jogging against him, rubbing up against sensitive parts inside he hadn't really thought about having. Peter had been right, he thought. They'd just needed to fuck. A distant part of his brain hoped he remembered why the hell they'd been fighting later, because at the moment it was hopeless. "Oh Peter… Oh Peter… Oh Peter…."

Peter smiled at him, jerking him off slowly and gradually making his own motions less and less pronounced. As he'd expected and hoped, Sylar took over, raising and lowering himself, fucking himself on Peter's shaft, picking his pace, angle and depth. Sylar wasn't going to last long, but that was part of his charm. Nathan had gotten to where he took forever. The sex was stale, the relationship damaged beyond repair and Peter couldn't get it up _at all_, not with all his control and training. It was amazing how that had slipped away once he was with someone else of his own free will.

"I love you, Sylar."

Sylar said something inarticulate that included another appeal to God, to Peter and something about being fucked. Peter grinned and shifted his grip, getting more of the loose skin around Sylar's member, sliding it up over his tip and enveloping him in it, then holding it there while he shook his hand up and down in quick, tense motions, stimulating just the head in that artificial sleeve. Sylar whined and bucked, coming right up off Peter's penis. He reached back, fumbled quickly and reinserted him without Peter's help. The moment he was back on, Peter resumed.

Sylar began groaning so loud it was nearly a yell. Having essentially had his reset button hit earlier, it took him a bit longer to ride the peak this time than he would have. Peter was watching him and the moment Sylar's muscles started to lock up and prevent him from continuing, Peter began thrusting into him in earnest, as hard as he could.

Sylar's eyes flew wide, his mouth fell open and he came, his semen surging across Peter's chest and hitting him in the chin and forehead. Peter laughed and kept stroking him, kept thrusting into him, using his right hand to push down on Sylar's hip, urging to take every thrust to the hilt, which he did. Peter's own orgasm came soon - watching Sylar come so hard was the best aphrodisiac he could imagine.

Virtually the second he was done, Peter rolled Sylar over, disengaged and climbed over him, kissing his chin, his jaw and the corners of his mouth. It was a pleading, supplicating pattern, like a puppy gave to an adult dog or a subordinate to an alpha. Sylar responded to it only muzzily at first, still lost in the afterglow. "Oh… Peter… Sure… What?" He kissed him back gently and it was what Peter needed. It was forgiveness. It was absolution. It was grace and mercy all together in one instinctive gesture. He needed that. He needed it so deeply he couldn't explain - he could only do.

"I'm sorry," Peter whispered between kisses. "I'm sorry for making you mad earlier. I knew the scorpion sting would hurt and it probably wouldn't do anything else to me and if it got too bad I _was_ going to heal. I exaggerated it, which you would have known if you'd actually been listening to me yesterday when I read it to you." He lifted for a moment and smiled, a hopeful, tentative tease. Then he leaned back in for more kisses. "I'm sorry. I wanted to know… I just wanted to know what you'd do. I'm sorry." He kept peppering him with kisses while Sylar brought his arms up around him and hugged him gently.

"You're getting cum on my face," Sylar said as he regained his senses. His voice was mild though.

"Mm!" Peter said enthusiastically, as if pleased to have this pointed out to him. He proceeded to lick up every trace, lingering kisses and sucking at Sylar's skin as the taller man stroked Peter's sides gently, his loving touch another benediction, another forgiveness to Peter.

Sylar rolled his eyes upwards and sighed, long-suffering. "Peter… that's kind of gross."

"Mm," he hummed, ignoring Sylar and finishing. He would have kept going even longer, but Sylar had dropped his hands to his sides and the moment was over.

When Peter lifted away, Sylar reached up and wiped the stray smears off Peter's forehead. No way was he touching that with his tongue. Sylar asked, sighing under the gaze of Peter's watchful, dark eyes, "Is sex with you ever anything less than mind-blowing?"

"Not if I can help it," Peter murmured.


	8. No One Can Shave You Now!

**A/N: Apologies for my juvenile sense of humor in titling some of these chapters. There's only one more chapter after this one. It wraps things up. It's written, but I want to fiddle with it some more. I'll post it today or tomorrow.**

They showered. It was brief, as the little solar-powered desalinization unit hadn't processed much additional water since they'd emptied it that morning. Fortunately there was a gage in the shower stall to let you know this, so they just kept the cleaning to the essentials and left it at that.

Peter fetched the implements for shaving without being asked and moved a chair out onto the patio, next to one of the recliners. He sat in the chair, duplicating their pattern of the first and last time they'd shaved one another by assuming Sylar would do Peter first. Sylar followed him out on the balcony and made no objection to it. He ruffled Peter's hair, noting that Peter tensed at the touch.

"Alright, pet?"

Peter nodded and rubbed the back of his head. "Scalp hurts." Sylar had yanked him around by the hair a bit. He dropped his gaze down and to the side, saying quietly, "Please don't ask me to heal again. I don't want to argue."

Sylar leaned down and kissed him on the top of the head. "I wouldn't. You see, that was _me_ hurting you, so that doesn't count." Sylar didn't want to argue either, but there were some things he needed to know about Peter, about how he really felt and what was motivating him. They weren't the kind of things he was likely to glean from conversation, though. He pondered this as he wrapped a hot, wet towel around Peter's face and took up the shaving cream. Peter had already inexpertly mixed it and Sylar began finishing the job, getting it creamier and worked into a lather.

Peter made a neutral sound and watched what Sylar was doing. He'd wondered why it didn't look the same when he was done with it. He'd assumed it was the brand. Apparently it was technique. Sylar worked at it until it was making stiff peaks like a meringue.

"I have to confess though," Sylar said in a quiet, calm tone. "I'm not real sure what was going on between us a little earlier." He put the bowl down and used one hand to strip off the towel and gently turn Peter's face. He brushed him with shaving cream, covering him fully. He kept his tone soft and unaccusing, suitable to the closeness they were sharing. "Are you saying I'm acting like Nathan? That you _want_ me to act like him? Or just that you expect me to?"

Peter blinked and looked aside. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't… I don't know." He glanced at the razor in Sylar's hand and turned back to face him. His expression was as trusting and accepting as it had been before, even if his eyes now also held more knowledge of who he was and the nature of their relationship. Knowing that didn't change how completely he gave himself over to Sylar, or at least how total it _looked_.

The Petrellis were far more manipulative than Sylar had given then credit for. He knew Peter manipulated him constantly and shamelessly, but he needed to know how real the adoring look was that Peter was giving him at the moment. Sylar took his time with honing and stroping the blade, as he wasn't familiar with the quality of the steel or entirely satisfied with the sharpness of it. He did touch up on the lather before tilting Peter's head back to work his neck with careful strokes. He didn't nick him this time. As he wiped the blade clean, he asked, "You really don't know what you want me to act like, or you don't want to say?"

Peter looked at him with a guarded expression. "What's the difference? I can't say it either way."

"Well, if you really don't know, I can find out, or at least I'd know enough that maybe we could talk it out. If you don't want to say, then I'll respect your privacy." Though if it was the latter, then that was going to eat at Sylar. It already was. He began working along Peter's cheeks, stretching the skin to get a close shave.

Peter looked at Sylar like he was an alien for a moment, then darted his eyes away without moving his head. "I really don't know."

"Hm." Sylar finished the first pass, being meticulous about it and repeated for a second. He didn't think Peter's face warranted a third. He was silent and speculative throughout and Peter let him keep the quiet. It was comfortable… and probably unwise to try to talk while Sylar was shaving him. He had not a mark on him when he was done.

_I need to know._ Sylar took a single finger and slid it under Peter's chin, turning him to face him. He leaned in, rubbed his lips together briefly, and touched them to Peter's. Little flashes and snippets of Peter's intention, desire and emotion flowed through the contact: _I want you; I'm afraid; I'm upset; I'm lonely; I miss my brother; That's wrong; _I'm_ wrong; I'm a freak; I don't deserve to be this happy; I should make you leave; Go away._

Peter pulled back with a jerk. He reached up and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. His eyes flashed for a moment, scanning over Sylar's surprised face, not sure what he'd seen. He calmed. Quietly he said, "You should have warned me."

Sylar blinked at him. "I'm sorry? I did say…" He knew full well he hadn't been explicit in his warning. He hadn't wanted to give Peter a chance to turn him down. It was too important.

Peter shook his head. "It's okay. I think… you meant well." He didn't look upset anymore, just a little put off. "Next time, be a little clearer on what you're going to do, before you do it."

"Hm. Yeah." Sylar exhaled. _That went better than I'd expected._ He considered what he'd seen. He reached out and stroked Peter's thigh above the knee, a consoling gesture. All the things he'd feared were addressed. Things he hadn't thought about much were the real issue and there was not much he could do about them other than support Peter and be there for him, be understanding and steady and take up the role of the responsible, strong person in the relationship. That was something Sylar could do.

Peter exhaled too and picked up the shaving cream. He rose and Sylar sat down, taking up the damp towel, heating it with an ability and draping it over his face. Peter put down the shaving cream and worked with the razor, exactly duplicating Sylar's earlier actions.

Sylar glanced over, suddenly smiling in realization. Muscle Memory - it was another ability. All Peter had to do was see something and he could do it himself. Well. That was probably why he knew how to make whipped cream but not cook a steak - he'd probably seen a cooking show once and while Sylar could imagine them covering how to whip cream, he couldn't see a TV chef going over how to grill a steak. It explained certain things in bed as well. Sylar made a note to himself to start using that ability himself more. It also told him that Peter had been seriously holding back in their fights, entirely turning off his abilities, including that one. _Huh_.

After enough time, he rubbed himself thoroughly with the towel and set it aside. Peter applied the lather. As Sylar had noticed before, it was really tough to be in someone's face and not communicate. Peter asked him, "What did you see?"

Sylar smiled a little. It was funny to think that the person who had the feelings and was experiencing them most directly probably wasn't able to understand them as well as someone else. They were too close to it, he suspected. He recalled that Peter had read him like a book after Peter got his abilities back, discerning things that Sylar didn't think he'd made up his mind about yet. He had a sudden understanding of why the ability demanded intimacy. It was quite possibly the most intimate thing he'd ever done.

Sylar said, "I saw that you don't think you deserve me, which is ridiculous. You're not a freak. You're fantastic." Peter gave a sardonic lift of his brows and looked away, taking up the razor. Sylar said, "Wait a little bit and let the shaving cream work. It softens the hairs. Just replicating the motions isn't everything."

"Oh. Okay." Peter sat down on the recliner. He rubbed at his own face, appreciating the smoothness. He reached out suddenly, compulsively, and put his hand on Sylar's knee. "I love you," he blurted out.

"I know," he said softly. He was sure now that Peter did and that surety was a warm blanket around his heart. Sylar went on, "I saw that you're grieving, even if you won't admit it to yourself. Everything's changed for you. You do a good job of acting like it doesn't matter, but it does."

Peter was breathing harder. He swallowed, eyes darting at Sylar uneasily. Sylar covered Peter's hand with his own, curling his fingers into it firmly. Peter bowed his head. Quietly Peter said, "I was the one who did it. I planned it. I… killed him. I shouldn't feel this way. It should be over. I should just be able to go on."

"You are going on, Peter." He gave his hand a squeeze. "I'm going to go on with you. This is good. Can you shave me now?"

Peter wiped at his eyes. "Yeah." He moved into position. "It's a good thing you've got regeneration." He fumbled the blade a bit, inhibited by his swollen index finger and the cloth wrapped tightly around it.

Sylar grinned. "Yeah, it is." He suspected this might be messy. "We're going to have a long time together, Peter." Peter's eyes widened slightly. "I love you too. You'll have plenty of chances to get better at it."

Peter blinked and smiled. "I wish I could just duplicate what you did on me earlier, but the perspective is wrong. If I could watch you shave someone else, I'd be fine."

"No. I like that this is just between us. There are some things I don't want to ever do with anyone else," Sylar said. Peter nodded and began, accidentally cutting Sylar almost immediately. Sylar considered whether that was a metaphor for anything. He decided it wasn't.

He held very still through the process and let Peter learn this skill in the normal fashion - by practice and experience. He still cut him six times, although as promised, Sylar healed. He considered that if the muscle memory only worked from watching as an outsider, rather than a participant, then he needed to start watching porn. It was an amusing thought. Or he could learn the same way Peter was learning shaving - the old fashioned way. There was certainly a lot to be said for practice.

When his face was wiped clean with a chilled towel, Sylar's fingers caught on Peter's arm and tried to pull him to him. Peter stiffened, a little wary. Sylar said, "It's just a kiss. I saw everything I needed to see earlier. If you don't want me to know more, I don't have to. I was only trying to help."

Peter nodded and kissed him. After he leaned his forehead against Sylar's and said, "Knowing what's up with me doesn't make it easier."

"Huh. Yeah. I suppose. It makes it easier for me though." Peter looked at him and Sylar said, "I thought you were just being an immature asshole, that you wanted me to be Nathan… or like a different version of Nathan who was easier for you to manipulate. And maybe that **is** what you want on some level, but your motivations are _way_ different than I thought they were and somehow that makes a world of difference."

"I… what are my motivations?" He smiled, sort of embarrassed. "I feel stupid for having to ask someone else that." He leaned away and finished cleaning and drying the blade before packing everything away.

"You're trying to run me off. But it's not because you're tired of me already or anything I've done. It's because you don't like yourself right now. Has nothing to do with me. I'm not going to let you run me off. At least, not over something like that." He stood and hugged Peter to him from behind. He bit Peter's shoulder and then kissed the spot. "This does answer a very important question," he said, twisting forward to steal a kiss on that baby-smooth cheek.

Peter waited a beat and when Sylar didn't elaborate, he asked, "What question is that?"

Sylar let him go and moved around to collect up towels. He hung them over the balcony rail to dry. "It's one of those important questions: If I was going to be stranded on a desert island and could take _one _person with me…"

They both laughed. Peter asked, "You'd take me?"

"You even need to ask? Of course I'd take you."

Peter shrugged and gave him a brief peck. He took the shaving tools inside and came back out. "So." He looked at his finger and chilled the wrap for it. "What are we going to do today?"

"Same thing we do everyday, Pinky."

Peter laughed again and punched Sylar in the arm. Sylar gave him a light jab in the gut. Peter jumped back, light on his feet. "You want to go again, big guy?"

Sylar backed up and put some distance between them. He looked around, concerned about what a fight would do to the balcony. "Let's go back to the beach."

"Sure."

"You need to show me some of your moves, too. You've been holding out on me."

"Ha. Yeah, a little bit. You didn't realize I've been letting you win all this time?" Peter's tone was teasing.

Sylar didn't take offense at that. Sometimes (pretty frequently, actually), Peter managed to say things just right so that the most obnoxious assertions didn't ruffle feathers. Sylar retorted, "That's because you want me so bad. You know it."

"Well… yeah, I do." They both laughed.

**A/N: Review please! (Yes, I really am that needy and insecure.)**


	9. End Times Are Upon Us!

**A/N: General reminder that **_**italics**_** are thoughts.**

They came back inside after a while for sandwiches. The satellite phone rang while they were eating and discussing personal phobias. It was a rude reminder of the world outside of themselves. For a brief moment, Sylar considered melting it for its insolence in disturbing them, but then Peter picked it up.

He talked for a while, giving general answers, telling whoever it was that Nathan was fine and hadn't even managed to get a sunburn yet. After a while he reached up and tapped his temple, then pointed at Sylar. He looked at him intently. Sylar shrugged, having no idea what Peter was trying to communicate.

A moment later he stiffened, feeling, or hearing, a mental feedback as Peter tried to read his mind. Sylar nodded and dropped the defenses that came automatically with that ability.

Peter thought to him, _It's Jason again. He wants to talk to you about the latest UN conference. He doesn't like Bob's take on it. _Bob was the vice president. He'd been left in charge. Sylar recalled hearing that while he'd been pretending to be Peter, standing around in a daze shortly after killing himself. And some other guys, but they hardly mattered.

Sylar asked, _What do you suggest I tell him?_

_It's complicated. You and I need to talk about it. I'll fill you in later. For now, tell him to do what Bob says. He won't screw it up any worse than it already was. You need to be Nathan to talk to him on the phone though._

Sylar nodded and shifted. Because they were linked, he sensed the wash of reaction from Peter at seeing Nathan's face: anger, hurt, grief, sorrow and confusion. Peter looked away and focused on what Jason was saying. He didn't cut the mental contact or even try to hide his response. He just tried to distract himself.

Sylar figured it was the healthiest thing he could probably do, but he resolved in that moment to minimize being Nathan. He heard a grateful flash of feeling from Peter at his resolution. A minute later Peter handed the phone to him and he listened to Jason describe the situation. Sylar followed Peter's advice, realizing that if he wanted to be in control of things, then he had to know more about what was going on.

Mentally he told Peter, _Oh yeah, you and I _really_ need to talk about this. We've got to figure out what we're going to do. Are you… ready for that?_

Peter nodded, chewing on his lunch and looking distant. As wonderful as their time together had been, it had to draw to a close. Sylar told Jason he'd be back in DC the next night and the morning after that he wanted a general overview of all the important issues, to be presented like he'd never seen them before. He said, "I've been thinking a lot and I think what I need is a new perspective on things. Get it set up. I want to see the big picture. I've been buried in details too long."

_Good,_ Peter thought to him, _but don't overdo it on the perspective thing. They'll flip out and think I'm influencing you. They're kind of sensitive about that._

_Fuck 'em,_ Sylar rejoined, but his thoughts betrayed him. He took Peter seriously. He had not forgotten how easily he had been subdued, when it came down to it.

Sylar wrapped up the conversation. He hung up and shifted back to his natural form. Peter dropped the mental contact as soon as they could speak freely to each other. He said, "So we have today and most of tomorrow."

"Mm-hm," Sylar nodded. "I'd like to spend most of that time figuring out my new job. Are you okay with leaving here in the morning and spending tomorrow daytime going around invisibly? You can show me all the places I should already be familiar with."

Peter agreed. "Yeah. This has been great though - here, together."

Sylar leaned over and kissed him gently. "I'll never forget it." He picked up his sandwich and looked over at the darkened floorboards from where Peter had irradiated the area. "We're a little rough on the place."

Peter snorted. "You and your obsession with flooring products."

Sylar gave him an easy grin and took another bite.

* * *

They spent the afternoon and evening deep in conversation, discussing and learning. Generally it was Peter teaching Sylar, but it also went the other way. Peter honestly didn't know what he wanted to do, other than make things better for people and end slavery. For all his impatience with personal issues, Sylar was more methodical and willing to invest in a long-term strategy. Fixing watches and delicate machinery was not a hobby for those who couldn't hold their temper.

The first thing he wanted to do, even before ending slavery, was to restore the election. He had every intention of manipulating it, so it wasn't like he'd had a change of heart and become a sappy goody-two-shoes. No, he was just lazy. It was much easier to have someone else handle the day-to-day affairs of the presidency while he directed them to accomplish what he wanted. Besides, he really, really didn't like how Peter had reacted to seeing him as Nathan.

After Nathan stepped down from the presidency and allowed a successor to take office, he could have a terrible 'accident.' Maybe he'd fly a plane into something and have his body burned almost recognition. It had a sort of irony to it, given his ability to fly. That sort of ending would send a message to anyone who had really known what was going on. Afterwards Sylar and Peter would be free to be together as they were.

All of the issues they were facing were complex. Peter wanted to make them simple, even though he knew better. Sylar plied him with questions and drew out the other factors and refused to accept _simple_. If it had been simple, then it wouldn't be something worthwhile for the president to tackle. The president had competent lackeys to handle 'simple.' It was his job to wade through 'complicated' and Sylar was exceptionally good at 'complicated.'

He was a lot better at it than Peter had imagined. Once he got his teeth into the problems, he wouldn't let go. Peter had stood by Nathan's side for nearly nine of his ten years of presidency. During that entire time, he'd had eidetic memory. Even if it only allowed him to recall things he'd paid attention to, he'd always been paying attention to _something_. He had other abilities similar to and including intuitive aptitude that let him make sense of what he remembered, should he turn his mental efforts to it. Sylar pushed him on it as hard as he could.

They were sitting on the beach, on the stolen recliner cushions, having watched the sun set hours before. Now they watched as a storm flashed on the horizon, taking up nearly a third of the sky, leaving the rest starry and pristine. It was coming up from the left, which was to the south, and heading north towards the US. It would certainly miss them, but it was close enough though that they could see the brilliant flashes of lightning and the intriguing formations of the clouds. It gave them something interesting to watch as they talked.

Peter was recounting to him the situation with the Chinese Yuan and the trade imbalance. It was something that had been growing, as a problem, for the last forty years and the accumulated debt (and worse yet, interest on the debt) was bringing the US to its knees. If Sylar was going to undermine the current social structure by doing away with slavery, then he had to understand how that would impact the economy. Peter had had the opportunity to get an explanation of the problem from the chairman of the Federal Reserve some four years earlier. Peter had asked why they couldn't just solve the problem by printing more money. He relayed that answer to Sylar now.

He was getting to the part about the role of the World Bank Group in influencing exchange rates when he rolled to his side and boldly slid his hand along Sylar's belly, making him tense a little at the sudden contact. He relaxed a second later and made an agreeable, "Hmm." He followed it up with, "Peter, I'm paying very close attention to you. Please don't think I'm not, even if I'm being quiet. This is a very important subject, literally worth all the money in the world."

"I know that," Peter murmured. His fingers started to toy with the elastic band of the shorts, poking under it experimentally. He didn't say anything else.

The silence stretched on. After so long of hearing Peter speak, it sounded odd to hear only the wind and the waves and the distant percussion of thunder. Peter leaned over to plant his lips on Sylar's elbow, working his way around his forearm.

"Peter?" There was no answer, as Peter's mouth was otherwise occupied trailing his tongue down towards Sylar's hand and across the back of it to his knuckles, where he paused to lick and suck the rougher skin. Sylar said, "Peter? I know this is… kind of romantic out here and we're alone… but I _was_ listening to you." He needed to know this stuff. He needed to know it a lot more than he needed to have sex for the third time that day - even if it was really great sex.

Peter appeared to ignore him. Instead he moved his hand past the barrier of the waistband and began to feel out how and exactly where Sylar's penis rested within the curls of his pubic hair. Sylar tilted his head back against the cushion and felt his breathing speed up. They'd used terrakinesis to heap up sand behind them so their adjacent cushions were propped up a little.

Peter was just insatiable with the sex and Sylar had come to the conclusion that it wasn't Peter's natural sex drive, because even now he almost certainly wasn't hard. He'd just decided, for whatever bizarre Peter reason, that it was time for Sylar to have sex with him. He was sure it had nothing to do with the conversational topic. Sylar grunted. It was high time to work out what was going on here.

He retrieved Peter's hand from his shorts and pulled the dark-haired man on top of him, straddling him. "Peter?"

"Yes?" he answered petulantly, sulking because he'd been interrupted.

"You said to warn you and let you know before I read you. I want to read you."

"Right now?" Peter pouted.

"Yes. Right now. I need to understand you."

"Why now?"

"Because what I need to know is close to the surface now. If I wait, I'll have to dig for it and you might not let me do that."

Peter grunted. He leaned down, but avoided Sylar's face, instead kissing at his neck. His hands drifted down to fondle Sylar's chest. Sylar swept up his own hands, finding Peter's and twining their fingers together. Peter cooperated for a moment, then realized Sylar had trapped his hands so he couldn't arouse him with them. Peter made a frustrated noise. "Don't you want me?" he whined.

"Yes, Peter. I want you so bad," Sylar growled. "I want you so bad it makes me _crazy_. I can't think and all I know when you're touching me like that is how much I want to touch you in return and take you and make you scream my name." He leaned forward and bit Peter on the chest, feeling the man arch and groan against him, tasting the lingering residue of the suntan lotion and ocean salt as he sucked his way down to Peter's nipple and gave it singular attention.

He teased it with his tongue, making it stand erect, hard and delicious. He paused, smiling smugly and looking up at Peter. Two could play this game. Peter looked down at him and whimpered at the cessation. Sylar asked, "May I?"

"Yes, of course." Peter pushed his chest forward, as his hands were still gripped by Sylar's.

Sylar leaned forward as if to continue, but just breathed across the wet flesh, giving a flash of heat followed by cool.

"Oh!" Peter squeaked adorably.

Sylar smiled back up at him. It had occurred to him at the last second that Peter might not have realized what he was asking, and he definitely wanted Peter's explicit consent for this, even if he was perfectly willing to addle the man's brains with lust first. "May I read you?" The ability required specialized, intimate contact. Kissing was not the only form this could take.

"Oh…" Peter shifted his hips, rubbing himself against Sylar's belly as he no doubt tried to consider this in the midst of passion, his judgment clouded. After a moment he said, "Yeah, whatever. I don't know what you-"

But Sylar didn't let him finish. He pressed his mouth over the nub and suckled, drawing in along with impressions and desires. He needed to know why… and a moment later he did. He pulled his head back and licked his lips, thinking for a moment. "Take your shorts off."

Peter hurried to comply, baring himself. Sylar shoved his shorts down while Peter was up. The dark haired man hesitated, looking at Sylar for directions. Seeing none, Peter straddled him again.

"You _need_ this," Sylar said, stroking himself with one hand and playing idly with Peter with the other.

"Yes, I need you," Peter agreed, stroking the sides of Sylar's face, leaning in to nuzzle along his eyebrows, fascinated by the strong lineament.

"No, it's more than that. You need to be reassured. You need to know I'm not going to milk you for what you know and move on. You need to know I'm more in love with you than I am with power. You need to know that no matter how involved I am in something, you can reach for me and I'll respond to you, that for all my control, I'll surrender it to _you_ when you offer me your body."

Peter's brows pulled together and he leaned back. "I want you to fuck me, Sylar," he said, sounding almost cross as he grossly over-simplified what was going on. He ran his thumb back and forth across Sylar's lower lip.

Sylar smiled and bit that thumb, biting down until Peter's face went to worried and then past it, letting his mouth fall open a little in desire. Sylar sucked the digit into his mouth and tongued it like it was a small phallus. Peter made a growling noise in his throat. When he Sylar finally moved his mouth to the side, Peter smeared the wet thumb up his cheek, leaving a trail of silvery coolness against Sylar's skin.

"Yeah, you want me to fuck you," Sylar said, "but I needed to know _why_. Now I do. And now I'm going to fuck you. Because that's just something you need." Peter's face looked uncertain and Sylar told him, "Peter, that's a need I am thrilled to be able to meet."

"Okay," Peter said breathily. "Thank you?" Not waiting for an answer to the ambiguous question, Peter leaned in and kissed him. Sylar stopped stroking himself - there was no further need, as the vulnerability and desire to please he'd seen in Peter's heart totally did it for him - he was rock hard. Instead he curled his fingers into Peter's crack, running them up and down as Peter's tongue explored his mouth.

"Erm. Hunh. Hrng." Peter vocalized into Sylar's mouth and pushed his rear end back against his hand. His fingers toyed with the hot, sensitive tissue of his anus, probing at it gently. He had no lubrication, but that just meant his hand kept spidering up and down, circling and pressing a little, then moving on to caress testicles and thighs and buttocks and ass crack before finding that spot again and repeating.

When Peter had had enough of this sweet torture, he finally lifted from Sylar's face and spat on his hand. He wiped it on his ass. Sylar matched him, smearing his shaft. Peter sunk down on him, taking him in several short descensions. He returned to kissing.

Sylar began stroking him, gripping him fully and moving up and down in time with Peter's motions on him. Every and then he would tighten his other arm around Peter's waist and thrust into him fast and repeatedly, pistoning inside him while Peter moaned wantonly. When those calls subsided, he would relax, settle himself again and go back to stroking and petting and kissing.

After several minutes, Peter leaned back, taking Sylar deeper and rubbing the head of his cock while Sylar still pumped his shaft. Panting, he said, "I'm… I'm supposed to be doing this for _you_."

Sylar smiled. Peter wasn't an idiot. "You are, Peter. You are. I know you are. Now come for me. I know you're close. You don't know how handsome you look there, riding up and down on me, eyes almost shut, that crooked mouth hanging open, lightning flashing behind you, just barely lit by starlight and the crescent moon. Oh God, Peter, I am so glad I have a perfect memory, because this is one I want to keep forever."

He felt Peter's member throb under his hand, then wet and hot as his ejaculate was deflected down by Peter's hand on the head of it. Peter smeared it down across Sylar's grip and it seemed he was intentionally wiping himself on him. Sylar minded, but not enough to complain if it was what Peter wanted to do. Peter was pretty hard to squick. He was a very biological sort of guy.

Sylar rammed into him several more times, then said, "Hold on now. I'm going to use telekinesis and flip you."

Peter nodded and Sylar shifted them so he was top and Peter was under him, missionary. He pushed back Peter's legs and hooked his hands under the knees where his thumbs were free to press into them.

"Oh!" Peter stiffened, eyes widening at the sensation and the realization of what Sylar might do to him.

Sylar smiled wickedly. "Oh yeah. You thought you were done, didn't you?" He ran his thumbs teasingly up and down, watching as Peter's whole body tightened. His expression was priceless. "Well,_ I'm_ not done, Peter. You started this. That means I get to finish it. You know what kind of a control freak I am," he said, still thrusting slowly into the other man, balls deep. Peter whimpered. Sylar grinned at that anticipatory sound.

"I want you to lay there and take it. Okay?"

Peter nodded, smiling a little. He chuckled, then laughed as Sylar's thumbs began to press into him. He squirmed on Sylar's cock, prompting him to shove into him harder, as hard as he could while still massaging the backs of Peter's knees, watching the warring expressions of concentration and a tickling, tingling pleasure so intense Peter almost couldn't stand it.

Sylar bared his teeth in savage joy at mastering him like this. If the little twerp wanted to interrupt his important understanding of the financial processes of the world, then he'd at least make Peter suffer for it. Sylar managed to last quite a while, not coming until Peter was choking on stifled gasps so much that he sounded like he really might asphyxiate. He might not have given him another orgasm, but Sylar knew he'd given him at least that much pleasure, unendurable as it might have been.

He held his position after he came, but shifted his hands to hold the outsides of Peter's knees. He looked up at the distant storm clouds, still buried in Peter's ass and trembling with the aftershocks, hearing Peter's rough breathing below him, feeling the other man's body calming as did his own. He watched the lightning and felt the sea breeze against his sweat dazzled skin, the rush of the orgasm making the whole world weirdly intense. He looked down at his lover's face and said, "This is paradise, Peter. It's heaven. Thank you for giving this to me."

* * *

Peter teleported them and the cushions to the bungalow. They retired to bed for a few hours, bodies tangled around one another. Sylar woke eager to get started making their plans into reality. He looked around the room and sighed. He was going to miss the place. But on the other hand, there was no reason why they couldn't come back the next time they had trouble and needed to sort it out.

He kissed the top of Peter's head and reached over to run his fingers across the now-permanently-tanned-on label on Peter's back. He could use regeneration now without losing it, for his body had finally accepted it as a permanent feature, like the left side of his lip or any other mark on him from his pre-ability days. It also meant he could heal his finger, which had swollen badly, but there were no other complications.

He nudged Peter awake, craning his neck to kiss the man's temple and cheek. "Hey there, Peter pet. Rise and shine. It's a brave new world and we need to get to work saving it." He nuzzled Peter's face. "We can be heroes. God knows this world needs some. Are you with me?"

Peter sighed and blinked sleep out of his eyes. He looked at Sylar blearily and said, "Always, master. Always."


End file.
